


Eyes Open

by anchvrdown



Category: All Time Low, Snow Patrol - Fandom
Genre: Jalex - Freeform, M/M, high school alternative universe, sterotypical lame fanfiction, this starts off really bad but it gets really good around chapter 7 and from then on
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-13
Updated: 2016-10-13
Packaged: 2018-08-08 14:37:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 34,442
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7761781
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anchvrdown/pseuds/anchvrdown
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>- In which a lonely kid named Alex who is only slightly obsessed with how colorful the whole planet is meets a lonely kid named Jack who has stopped obsessing over anything and spends his days desperately seeking someone to fill an empty space in his life. </p><p>"Just keep your eyes open."</p><p>[Based off of the album "Eyes Open" by Snow Patrol]</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. You're All I Have

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack Barakat is lonely and desperate to make a new friend to replace an old one. When Alex Gaskarth ends up in many of his classes and a locker right next to his, Jack is fully determined to befriend this quiet, and fairly rude, new kid.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi! So, this is a Jalex that I started writing sometime in April and still haven't finished due to other stories, school, camp, general procrastination, and other shit. I posted it on Wattpad (I'm demolitioniero on there) so it's also on there. This first chapter might seem stupid (as most first chapters do) but it gets a lot better.  
> Also- this whole story is somewhat based off of the album "Eyes Open" by Snow Patrol. Every chapter is named after a song or bonus track on the album. Carry on.

Loneliness was something that Jack Barakat hadn't felt for a while. He was sitting on his bed. He still had bedhead and was half dressed, wearing the old, faded Switchfoot shirt that he slept in, and his favorite skinny jeans that were too tight to wear for more than 8 hours at a time. He had put on his jeans but given up with the rest of his "getting dressed" routine because he couldn't feel bothered to do anything else except for feel sorry for himself. The tears that were welling up in his eyes had begun to streak down his face, just adding to his pathetic picture. There was so much that he had to do, so much that he had to get rid of. The pictures stuck in the corner of his mirror, the stuff that he had left behind, all the random things he had left all over Jack's house. He had never expected any of the things scattered around his house would be part of the reason he was sitting on his bed crying and feeling like an idiot. The smell of him still lingered on the shirt he had borrowed from Jack, the shirt that Jack was too lazy to wash. He was everywhere, a ghost haunting Jack's heart and taunting him with the little things that didn't matter two months ago, but meant everything now.

He wouldn't leave.

Jack knew he probably wouldn't see Zack Merrick ever again. It always had to work that way, that you became best friends with someone and then either you or they had to move, and then you were all alone with the feeling that your heart had been carelessly buried six feet under a pile of empty memories.

Zack had moved to Hawaii, completely across the country and then some. Out in the middle of the ocean, on a desolate island that wasn't quite so desolate. A perfect remedy on how to forget your best friend. Jack's parents were okay with Zack, but Zack's parents hated Jack. Jack was loud, rowdy, and ultimately rude in their humble opinions. They would never let their treasured son fly back to Baltimore to visit his best friend. If Jack was even his best friend anymore. Jack wondered why he was treasuring their friendship so much. Not all of it had been good, of course, they had had their fights and bad times, but it seemed like all Jack was reminiscing on were the good times, and not the times where Zack had made Jack feel like shit. It hadn't happened too often, but it had happened enough for a few days of them ignoring each other to ensue.

"Jack, what are you doing? You've got school!" Jack's older sister, May, flung open the door, not expecting to see her brother still half in his pajamas, looking like he was about to, or even starting to, break down.

"Jack? What's wrong?" Jack shrugged, knowing that he would probably start crying even more if he spoke. It hurt to be sitting there, to swallow down the excessive amount of tears built up in his throat. He had never felt the need for anything like this before, all he needed was Zack to be there. He would go to school and Zack wouldn't be there, the locker on his right would be empty. No more conversations, nothing else except for golden memories turned stale.

"Hey, okay, I don't know what's wrong- but it's Friday! Right? You can just sit in your room and cry all weekend if that would make anything better! Just for today, you've gotta get up and get dressed and get your ass to school and make it through the day, alright?" Jack nodded, and May reminded him that he had ten minutes to get ready so she could drive them to school, before glancing at herself in Jack's mirror like the vain little creature she was, shutting the door softly behind her. Jack pulled himself off of his bed, continuing with his morning routine of stumbling around his room.

Looking at himself in the mirror, he took another deep breath. Today, he was going to find someone to replace Zack. It had been two months, Jack had to get himself together. He was going to be extra Jack, he was going to try extra hard to attempt to put Zack behind him. He was going to delete his text conversation with Zack. Crying over his dumb friend wasn't going to fix anything. He was going to wipe Zack from his mind and find someone new, someone, better. Life was going to be something better.

Jack made his hair extra spiky that morning.

\-------

There was a boy with long brown hair standing at Zack's locker, fiddling with the combination.

"Hello there! I'm Jack!" Not a word came from the boy.

"What's your name?" Again, nothing. He opened Zack's locker and went through his bag, grabbing stuff that he decided he would need for class.

"What class do you have first?" Jack was still ignored. The boy turned and set off down the hallway. Jack strolled next to him, talking about the school. The high school was pretty small, so Jack knew if they would have gotten a new kid or not, and this kid was completely new. New and rude, that was for sure. Jack followed him down the hall. No, he wasn't even following him. They were going in the same direction. The brunette boy didn't seem to make any notion that he recognized Jack as anything more than empty air. Jack was shocked when the boy turned into the classroom that Jack had planned on entering, and was even more pleased when he found an empty seat next to him.

"So where'd you move from?" Another silence. Jack resorted to talking about what he had done on Saturday, hoping to get an answer back. Attendance was called, and the boy answered to the name of "Alexander Gaskarth," with a sharp "here," which was followed by a disappointing lack of words.

"Alexander, huh? That's too long. Can I call you Alex?" Alex sat stock-still, staring straight ahead. The whiteboard didn't seem quite as interesting to Jack as it was to Alex. The way that Jack was staring at Alex was the way an artist would stare at someone they were sketching or painting. Jack didn't have any artistic talents, but he wouldn't have complained about having to draw Alex. He was perfect to be drawn right there. His eyes had turned down to the table but he still wasn't moving, and the dust particles in the air were highlighted by the sunlight filtering in through the slatted blinds. His long brown hair fell in front of his face, choppy enough so it brushed across his eyes, just long enough to look unkempt but short enough to let him see. Jack knew that if he drew Alex, he would definitely color in his hair. He would use so many different shades of brown to make it the perfect chestnut color that it was, with the light shine and the little streaks that were lighter, a honey color. And there were parts where it seemed redder, more of an auburn shade. Alex's hair was the color of fall and it was warm and wonderful. Beyond his hair, the curve of his nose led down into his soft, pink lips that Jack found himself staring intensely at. How would he draw those? And how would he draw the curve of his jaw and draw all the lines in a way that didn't show Alex as someone being drawn to perfection, just draw him as Alexander Gaskarth, just as he was? Smudging the colors, rounding the lines but straightening some of them, giving the drawing a homemade look that was so real it was almost as if the boy in the drawing could turn his head and step out of his paper.

Jack wasn't obsessed or anything of the sort, seeing as he had only "known" Alex for a very short amount of time. He couldn't help but think that Alex was absolutely beautiful, and wished that the boy would just say something to his desperate, affection-craving soul. Jack's head lay on his elbow, which lay on the table. Weariness warmed his body, and the gentle sunlight didn't make any of the tiredness from the previous night of sleeplessness disappear. Jack was only brought out of his trance-like state by the high pitched shrieking of the bell, and he was behind in his mission of following Alex out of class. He had expected to see at least a small amount of emotion on the other boy's face, but none had been shown whatsoever. Alex said absolutely nothing to Jack, not even acknowledging his presence. Jack was simply trying to convince himself that this fascinating boy was playing hard to get, but in the class before P.E, which would be the last class of the day, Alex disappeared behind the door to a room that Jack had never found out the name to. Jack had World History and was prepared to lay his head down on the desk and think about not thinking about Zack. Jack stood alone in the hallway, staring at the boring, brown wooden door in front of his face. It was that room. It was the room that the "special needs" kids had to go into from time to time, depending on what their "special needs" were. Jack hated that title, "special needs." The way people referred to anyone who had anything distinctly different about them as if they were aliens who didn't belong anywhere. Jack felt a nagging sense of curiosity hanging over his brain because he wanted to know why Alex was in there. Of course, that was none of his business, and he turned back around to head back the way he was supposed to be going.

\-------

"Partner up, go practice!" Jack tripped over his own feet as he scrambled in Alex's direction, dusting off himself and his hideous gym uniform.

"Hi! Can we be partners?" Alex gave him a look that downplayed all of his energy and made him feel like part of the glossy gym floor that was already covered in dusty footprints. However, a curt nod hit Jack like a battering ram and he realized that Alex had recognized that he existed. Alex grabbed a hockey stick and marched across the gym with a purpose to do something quite unpurposeful. He turned around, eyeing Jack with a somewhat confused expression on his face. Jack had the faded orange, plastic puck in his hand. Placing it on the ground, he pulled his stick back and slammed it into the floor, yelping as he realized that he had missed the puck and left a black rubber scrape-mark on the floor. The glossy gym floor that had been polished and shined to perfection. The glossy gym floor that the gym teacher had given a speech on about "not messing up the shiny beautiful floors." The puck hadn't moved one centimeter, and Jack looked around in fear. His eyes landed back on Alex, who stood halfway across the gym, the back of his hand pressed against his mouth. He was smiling. He was laughing.

Alexander Gaskarth had shown some sort of emotion towards Jack. Maybe, Jack thought, maybe Alex would be enough to distract his lonely heart from Zack.

Maybe he would be enough.


	2. Hands Open

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack Barakat is still extremely desperate and won't leave Alex Gaskarth alone. Alex, on the other hand, has befriended an egg with a smile with the alias of Rian Dawson. Yet when Alex ends up having a breakdown and Jack seems to be the only person there to comfort him, Alex takes a few seconds to stop ignoring the boy who is in dire need of his attention.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi again! This chapter is mediocre, but it's alright, I suppose. Enjoy!

Alex Gaskarth didn't like combination locks. He wasn't good with numbers, he wasn't good with spinning the lock in the right directions, and he wasn't good at pressing it down hard enough at the right times. He didn't like seeing Jack watch as he struggled to open the stupid lock on his stupid locker out of the corner of his eye. Alex was almost waiting for Jack to offer his help, and that's just what happened.

"I can open it, you know. I know the combo." Alex didn't ask why Jack knew that, just stepped back and let Jack open the locker. Jack smiled at him, a gesture which Alex didn't return. Jack knew that Alex had messed up; Alex himself knew that he shouldn't have let that smile slip in gym class. Grabbing his bag, Alex walked down the hall and out the doors, with Jack at his side. Jack said goodbye to him, telling him to have a good rest of his day and left Alex standing staring at the car in front of him. It was his car, the faded turquoise Honda Civic that belonged to him, it was the same car. Of course, there was more rust on it, and a little dent right above the right front tire.

"Lexxxx!" The car pulled up to the curb, and Alex jumped inside, smiling at the smell, smiling at his half brother's face. He could smile here, in the soft seats of the car. Leather, cigarettes, and the familiar smell that Tom seemed to carry around with him everywhere filled the car, and Alex felt relieved and happy. He only felt that way for maybe fifteen seconds, until he realized that he was actually sitting in his half brother's beaten up turquoise car.

"Why are you here?"

"Don't I get a hello?" Tom started driving, automatically seeming to know that Alex had "therapy," or "counseling," or whatever the fuck it was called right after school.

"Why are you here?" Alex repeated, not wasting any time with greetings, getting right to the anxiety brimming in his chest. Tom didn't reply, and Alex got straight to thinking. Thinking was something he was good at, and bad at at the same time. Sometimes he just ended up thinking too much, thinking about things that he shouldn't be considering. Then, he could think about math. He knew math. Math was the only thing that he was really good at, there were no problems when it came to math. And then there was the thinking about reasons his older half brother had shown up out of nowhere to pick him up from school. Tom never visited unless he needed something. They were nearing the office of Miss Beatrice Emilia Lodonson, Alex's therapist or counselor or whatever the fuck she was called, and Alex needed an answer.

"You need money." There was no other explanation for Tom showing up other than wanting, or needing, money. He would always trick Alex into believing that he cared about him enough to spend time with him, get what he needed, and then leave without even saying goodbye. Too many times Alex had woken up, expecting Tom to be there with his sly smile and stupid nicknames, but only being left with the regular silence of the house that existed without the company of the only person that really acted like they cared about Alex.

"It's not like that-"

"Of course it's like that! You never come just to visit, you come for money! Money to buy you things that you don't even need. Don't you even care about us?"

"Of course I do, I just, I-" They were in the parking lot and Alex leapt out of the car, slamming the already dented door behind him.

"Fuck you," he spat behind him, kicking the door of the damaged car with fresh anger. Alex glared at Tom as he turned on his heel, marching up the stairs while he continued his thinking, positively fuming.

\-------

Alex had a friend. Miss Beatrice Emilia Lodonson had advised that Alex should attempt at making friends, so Alex had picked a boy to become his friend. This boy was quite strange, but nice and quite amiable. He looked like an egg, as Alex had already informed him. He had short brown hair, tan skin, and lots of bright white teeth. Robert Rian Dawson was what the boy was called, but he preferred Rian. Rian was nice, and not very annoying at all. Speaking of annoying, in the three weeks that Alex had spent at the school, Jack had not once left him alone. Every day, Jack would provide Alex with a bright smile and words that made no difference to Alex's life.

They made no difference to his life except that he kept them all safe in his head. Two days ago, Jack said that his sister's boyfriend had broken up with her. She had eaten all the ice cream in the house and had soaked Jack's shirt from crying so much. Her name was May, and she had lay on Jack's bed, quite similar to a dog, crying all night long.

Yesterday, Jack's cat had died. His name was Jerry. Jack had found him out in the middle of the road, flattened by a car. He spared Alex the gory details, but Alex could tell that Jack was sad about the loss of Jerry. Alex wished he could say something, but only ignored Jack as he usually did. He felt better when he talked to Rian, though. Rian was nice.

Alex had had a bad night when he walked into the house to find Tom passed out on Alex's floor, cradling a bottle of whiskey in his arms. When Alex woke him up, all he could say was,

"Don't tell them I'm here, I'm not supposed to be here." Alex had reluctantly let Tom sleep in his beautiful green beanbag chair, hating seeing his sad, drunken form collapsed in the chair. Alex had found a way to go over to Rian's house most days after school, not wanting to go home to see Tom's pathetic self waste away until he would slowly become nothing. To say that Alex had been enjoying Rian's company was an understatement, Alex had been having so much fun spending time with the other boy. They had gone and sat inside of the huge loft building for the Museum of Visionary Art the previous Friday, enduring a long walk from school but quite a rewarding day, as there was a giant chess board inside. It was painted on the floor, with huge chess pieces, covered in dust and positively begging to be dragged around in a painful game of chess. Then they had gotten ice cream and rolled down hills. Another day, the pair had tried teeth whitening strips, resulting in Alex throwing up and Rian's teeth turning blue for the rest of the evening.

It was lunchtime, and Rian was talking about the fact that he had to decorate donuts for some event his mom was hosting. Rian had caught on to the fact that Alex was trying to spend as much time away from home as possible, but didn't question why. He tried to spend as much time with Alex as possible, knowing that the kid needed a friend and was happy to be that friend. Alex was weird, but Alex was fun. So as they were discussing donut icing techniques, Jack Barakat sat down at their table.

"What are you guys talking about?" Alex shut his mouth right away, glancing away from the dark haired boy.

"Donuts," Rian said to Jack, rolling his eyes at Alex.

"Donuts! Cool, donuts are great. Don't you think, Alex?" Alex got up, walking past both of them. Any eye contact he had been maintaining with Rian was lost, and he adopted the attitude that he knew neither of the boys. Rian scoffed, watching his friend go. Jack just smiled, he knew that Alex would snap soon.

\-------

Rian crashed into Alex in the hallway. Neither of them meant to smash into each other, but Rian was looking for Alex and Alex was looking at the floor. Neither of them realized that they had hit each other, until Rian recognized Alex's navy blue hoodie and yanked him back. Alex had been attempting to step around Rian, eager to avoid him.

"Are you serious?" Rian demanded. Alex attempted to step past him once again, but Rian moved in front of him to make it impossible for Alex to get around him. "You're ignoring me now, too? Really fucking mature, thanks." Alex was having a staring contest with Rian's shoes, and wasn't planning on losing anytime soon. "Grow up," Rian muttered, shoving past Alex and continuing down the hall. Rian had never been good friends with anyone, and was just beginning to think that maybe Alex would actually be a genuine friend. He wasn't expecting to get dropped this quickly, and didn't hesitate in letting Alex know how he felt. Alex moved his gaze directly to the ground, since Rian's shoes were gone. Tears welled up in his eyes, and he heard the bell ring. He was stupid, he did need to grow up.

"You know, he's very over emotional. Probably delayed learning, as you've already realized. Key concepts, common sense, it doesn't really apply to him. He's not really the smartest kid. You've got to take special care of him."

Alex felt even more tears streak down his cheeks, but he didn't care. Turning around and walking down the hall, the one person he didn't want to see appeared.

"Oh hi- what's wrong?" Alex just shook his head, wiping at his eyes. Jack's cheerful expression had faded to one of concern, and now he was looking around the halls.

"You are gonna get so much shit for this! Come on, come with me." Alex followed him without a word, knowing that he was pleased to hear Alex's footsteps behind him. Jack had lead Alex to the back of the building, pushing the doors open and made sure that Alex was still following him. Alex didn't know where Jack was taking him but he didn't care at this point. The two ended up on the football field. Jack climbed over a short, black fence and found himself in a shady, tree-covered area with a small, muddy creek running through it. Alex sat down on a rock, glad that he had managed to stop crying. On the other hand, he was regretting the idea to go anywhere with Jack, who was staring at him as though he was an alien.

"What am I going to get shit for?" Alex asked in a small voice.

"Crying at school. It was a stupid thing to say," Jack replied, sitting down on a patch of ground that wasn't as muddy as everything else.

"What's wrong?" Alex knew the question would come sooner or later, but he didn't know how to reply to it.

"I'm not sure." Jack nodded, in a fake-understanding kind of way.

"Why are you talking to me all of a sudden?"

"Why not?"


	3. Chasing Cars

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Days spent decorating donuts and throwing paint balloons with Rian Dawson, and, more specifically, Jack Barakat, had made Alex realize that he really did enjoy the company of certain people.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I suck at writing summaries, I'm so sorry. Anyways, these beginning chapters are really lame and short but they get WAY better later on, trust me.

"What if you stuck your dick through a donut?"

"I'm sure someone's already done that."

"Of course, why wouldn't someone? Have you?"

"No, no I haven't. Why, have you?"

"No, Alex, have you?"

"No." Alex, Jack, and Rian were sitting at a picnic table in Rian's backyard, decorating donuts. Jack had brought up the topic of dicks in donuts, which neither Alex nor Rian were too keen to discuss. Since the three of them were smart young men, they were using brittle play-doh molds to make cool icing designs for their donuts. Alex had suggested that they clean off the molds before they molded the icing onto them, and in the process had realized that he wanted some play-doh very badly. Jack was trying to trace dicks on every donut with blue icing, while Alex was absentmindedly eating everything and wishing they had proper play-doh to use. Rian was a perfectionist, and was drawing up award-worthy art on the formerly plain donuts. After their decorating session had dragged on for far too long, Rian's mom appeared.

"Boys! Oh, you did so much work!" Rian panicked, giving the donuts that Jack had been working on a murderous look. All three of them knew that they were in trouble, and Jack grabbed a zig-zag print mold and slammed it into the donuts with a reasonable amount of violence and urgency. Rian's mom looked at Jack with concern in her eyes, eyes that had lost their sharp vision and couldn't see the messily drawn dicks on her donuts.

"You can take a break, I think we have enough at this point. Thank you!" She said, smiling at them with overwhelming brightness radiating off of her. Rian's whole family had freakishly bright smiles and auras of complete euphoria. As Rian's mom took the tray of donuts back inside, Alex finally spoke what was on his mind.

"I really want some play doh."

\-------

Alex felt strange. He was walking home with his arms in a stiff, awkward position but his heart felt so incredibly light. Play-doh and paint was splattered all over his t-shirt and jeans, causing his shirt to stiffen up to result in his arms being held in the strange position. Along with his arms feeling strange, he himself just felt... weird. Weird in a good way, he supposed. There wasn't another word for it, and he was shocked to place it as "wanted." That's it, he felt wanted. Not special really, not needed by a long shot, but wanted. Jack and Rian didn't even know about the thing, but Alex wasn't sure how they would treat him if they knew. It would be as if their words would suddenly become babied and soft, and any edge to their voices would be lost. Alex was relishing the way he was being treated, like a normal human being. The only person who had ever really treated him like a friend was Tom, and Alex didn't retaliate with any affection.

Stumbling across the front lawn that was appealingly streaked with the gold and russet leaves of autumn, Alex thought about what he was going to tell Miss Beatrice Emilia Lodonson that day. Opening the door to his house, he wondered if he liked Jack. "Like," in the way that he would want to spend more time with him, to throw paint balloons at him more often. Alex's thoughts were cut off by the high pitched sound of his mother's voice.

"Alex! Where have you been?"

"I was at my friend Rian's house," Alex replied quietly, biting the already ragged inside of his cheek when he saw the look of surprise on his mom's face. Alex had a bad habit of biting at the inside of his cheek, ripping the skin to shreds and sometimes even leaving him with a mouth full of blood. The brown-haired boy couldn't remember the last time he had had a proper friend, or if he had even had one at all. Not that he was certain that Jack and Rian were even his friends, but the warm, calm aura that the two exuded made him feel safe and peaceful. Of course, Alex wasn't sure if he was able to trust them, because he never knew who was going to abandon him in an instant. 

"Who's this Rian? And what happened to you?"

"We had a paint balloon fight. And Rian is Rian. He looks like an egg. He has nice teeth. I also have a friend named Jack. His hair is stupid, but I think he might be smart." Alex's mom was probably considering everything that Alex was saying and wondering if these two were imaginary friends. However, there would be no reason for him to stumble in with a shirt smattered with play-doh and paint.

"That's very nice, Alex. You should have them over sometime." Alex nodded, glancing at the clock.

"I need to change," he said, heading down the hall to his room. Opening the door, a scowl automatically appeared on his face.

"Please," was the first word out of Tom's mouth. Alex didn't want to give him the time of day, but felt compelled to. His half brother was barely even able to sit up, pressed between a dresser and the wall. "I know I'm not supposed to be here, but I, I'm sorry. Please d-don't tell them." The words coming out of Tom's mouth were slurred and ugly; Alex wished they had never been spoken.

"I need to go to see Miss Beatrice." It was a statement, a blank one that didn't address anything about the situation involving Tom sitting on Alex's bedroom floor with an unhealthy amount of alcohol in his body. Tom didn't say anything, just closed his eyes and held on to the dresser for dear life.

"Will you be here when I get back?" Alex had thought before he spoke, something that he was working on doing. Miss Beatrice said that it was good to think before you spoke, and that Alex didn't seem to do it often enough.

"I dunno." Alex left after that. He didn't want Tom there. However, he didn't get as angry as he usually did with Tom. He didn't slam the door to the bathroom, he just shut it properly. He changed his shirt and pants, because he had to look presentable for Miss Beatrice. She would be concerned about him if he didn't, and would have to ask if his parents were doing a good enough job taking care of him. Alex thought that she would be a much better parent than his own parents. Of course, she tried to treat him like a real person, but that was only her job.

\-------

Miss Beatrice Emilia Lodonson spent her days talking to people. Some of them relied on her with their lives, completely breaking down if there were ever a day where they couldn't speak to her. Some people were rational enough to speak with her a few times and feel better about their lives, only coming back if they were in a bad place again. Then there were the people who were being forced to see her, usually teenagers or people who felt obliged to see her because their family or friends felt like they needed to "see someone."

But then there was Alex Gaskarth.

Alex had a mild form of autism. Though the word really meant nothing to him, it meant a hell of a lot to everyone else. Alex hated when anyone found out about it and outright changed how they treated him. They would treat him normally one second, and the next they were treating him like a five year old. Of course, he occasionally needed the casual reminder to do basic things. "Remember to eat, remember to shower, remember to shave, remember to practice your speaking." None of that had to change the way Alex was viewed by anyone else, and everything just mixed together to make Alex much more of his own person. He wore the same grey jeans, green t-shirt and navy hoodie every single day. On good days, he would put on his Green Day "Dookie" shirt. Those days were rare, and everytime Miss Beatrice saw him wearing the shirt, he would always have a story to tell about it. That day, Alex had started out with talking about his brother. He seemed to want to get it out of the way, complaining about everything that Tom did and that he had invaded Alex's room, the one place that was only his. Alex felt guilty for not being kind to his brother, but he felt sad that Tom was always drinking and always sad. It was hard to be kind to someone who makes you feel so sad. After rushing through a great range and display of emotions, Alex got to the things that were exciting him.

He had friends. There were two of them, a boy named Rian with a I and not a Y, and Jack. They liked decorating donuts and were smart and calm, and they were also nice. Jack liked talking, and Rian didn't as much. All three of them liked the same kind of music, but Rian and Jack liked it much louder than Alex would prefer, and they liked throwing paint balloons. Before Alex knew it, all he was talking about was Jack. Of course, he wasn't completely aware of his words. When it came to Miss Beatrice, he could say anything at all and it would be okay.

Well, that wasn't true. If he said that he was planning on killing himself, Miss Beatrice would have to tell his parents. But he wasn't planning on killing himself, he was planning on talking about Jack. Miss Beatrice was convinced, after 45 minutes, that Alex had found someone who really cared about him, and someone who he really cared about.

At the very end of their session, Miss Beatrice had one question for Alex.

"Does Jack know?" Alex knew what "know" meant, and he wished that he didn't.

"No."

"Do you think he'll care?" A long pause followed that, and Alex wished that he didn't have to think about the answer.

"No." 

No meant a lot, because whenever the question of "do you think they'll care?" came up, the answer was usually a "yes." Alex was always so afraid that people were going to treat him differently because of something that hardly even mattered to him. Unfortunately, he was usually treated diversely as soon as anyone somehow figured it out. Since Alex didn't have very many influential people in his life, there were only a minimal amount of people that Alex would answer "no" to that question while discussing. A "no" meant that this person would look past something like a disorder like that. A "no" meant that Alex wouldn't be babied, a "no" meant that Alex would still be taken seriously, a "no" meant that Alex would be valued for exactly what he was. 

A "no" meant everything.


	4. Shut Your Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Winter break starts, and Rian starts his by flying down to Florida. Jack and Alex start theirs by watching an ambulance drive away from Alex's house just as they arrive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Should I be sorry about this chapter? Probably. (Also it's super short sorry)

Snow tumbled out of the sky in fat flakes, blanketing the ground and soaking the grass. Jack was staring at the sky with his mouth opened, tongue outstretched to catch the flakes. Alex was wearing a bright turquoise gay-ass scarf that he had refused to take off all day long. Rian was watching Jack stumble around with his mouth tilted up to the sky in amusement. The three boys were walking down the street to Rian's house, Alex and Jack there to bid goodbye to their friend. School had ended for the day, and the rest of the week for that measure, leaving everyone to escape for winter break. Rian was making his way down to sunny Florida, leaving Jack and Alex to stick out the snow in Baltimore for a week and a half. As they reached Rian's house, their goodbyes were said and hugs were exchanged, because Jack still was craving the affection that Zack wasn't there to give him anymore. Rian disappeared inside of his house, leaving Jack and Alex to make their way back down his street, not knowing where to go.

"Should we go to my house? We can watch Home Alone. And it's closer," Alex suggested. He had been working on speaking with Miss Beatrice, and he was getting much better at making normal conversation and not sounding ridiculous. Yet, Alex was the only one who really considered himself stupid at times. If he was really that stupid, Jack and Rian wouldn't want to be around him. Alex found himself immersed in the different shades of color that the street consisted of, when Jack nudged him.

"Isn't that your house?" Alex looked up, and his heart sunk when he saw an ambulance sitting outside of his house.

"Yeah," he said in a quiet voice, his hands immediately shaking. "Why are they here? What's happening?" He stopped walking, afraid to find out what was going on. The colors of everything suddenly seemed so much brighter, and everything was completely overwhelming. The grey of the sky seemed blinding, all the snow were LED lights flying down from out of the clouds, the street was a solid slate grey color that made everything spin around him, and the ambulance was a bleating neon box of pain. Alex leaned against Jack, not knowing where to put his feet.

"Alex-"

"Is it Tom? Maybe it's Tom. What if Tom got hurt?" Nobody was able to find out if Tom got hurt, because the ambulance took off moments after Alex's words left his mouth, and the pair watched the ambulance speed down the street. Jack stared at Alex, who stared right back at him. Jack's eyes were an overwhelming brown, and Alex looked away to look back at the street that was giving him a headache. Everything was giving him a headache, and he felt like his head was going to explode.

"Look, it'll be fine. Do you want to call your parents, make sure they're alright?" Alex didn't say anything. "Alex?" It was like that day at school where Alex didn't reply to anything Jack said.

"Come on, let's go inside."

\-------

Jack had never been good with comforting people. So when the call came from the hospital and Alex's mom managed to sob out the news that Tom Gaskarth was no longer a living, breathing, human being, Jack didn't know what to do. He didn't know Tom at all, hell, he had never even met him. Alex didn't know what to do either, and was sitting on his bed asking the same question over and over again.

"Where is Tom? Where is he? Where's Tom?" Jack didn't know how to reply, and didn't know when Alex was ever going to understand.

"He's, he's.... He's not around. I'm sorry, he's not going to be around for a while. A long, long while." Alex stared at him with confusion brimming in his eyes.

"When will I see him again? Will I ever see him again? Why isn't he going to be around? Was it my fault?" Jack felt like he was talking to a little kid, explaining the concept of death to them. The fact that Alex had asked the question about Tom's death being his fault fucked with Jack's emotions even more, and he found himself choked up and not knowing how to answer his friend's questions.

"Listen, I'm not sure when you're gonna see him again. I'm not sure if you're ever gonna see him again." A long silence followed that, a silence that Jack wished wasn't there. When Alex finally spoke, his voice was so quiet and soft that Jack barely heard him.

"What?" Alex's voice cracked, and Jack saw the tears filling his eyes. He had somewhat realized what had happened, but obviously not completely.

"I'm so sorry. It's not your fault, though. You had nothing to do with this, I'm so sorry."

"No, no, no, this is just a bad dream. I'll just wake up and you'll be at home and I'll go to school and- and everything'll be alright. Everything is gonna be okay. Everything is gonna be okay. Ev-everything is gonna be okay." Jack wished that he could agree, and bit his lip as he saw tears fall down Alex's face.

"Everything is gonna be okay, Tom is gonna be okay."

\-------

Alex had been repeating the same ten words over and over again, for too long for Jack to think of. It had been hours for sure, and Alex was a horrible wreck. He had started off emotionless his eyes glassy and lifeless, then moved to crying, then moved to sobbing where he was screaming the words at Jack, and was now whispering the words as he sat, wrapped in his blanket. His cheeks were red, his eyes glassy and his throat sore. The rough voice kept repeating the words that were stuck on loop in his head.

"Everything is gonna be okay, Tom is gonna be okay."

Jack never replied. Alex's parents had arrived home but hadn't checked in on their son. There wasn't much anyone could do for him at this point, and all Jack could do was lie to him.

"You should sleep. When you wake up, things will be okay again."

\-------

It was cold in Alex's room. He woke up with Jack's arms wrapped around him, the two lying in bed next to each other. Alex began to tense up at the feeling of someone else's body touching his, as he wasn't one for human contact, but he felt very safe in Jack's arms. He felt safe and he felt okay. Jack's arms were warm, but something else was very cold. Something was missing, something was wrong. It took a moment for it to hit Alex, but he realized it right away. He felt like he had been punched in the throat, and gasped, recoiling back into Jack's arms. He closed his eyes, wishing everything would go away. He just wanted it all to go away.

\------

Everything had been fine. No, everything had been better than fine. Rian was going away on vacation. Rian existed. Rian was Alex's friend, Rian was Jack's friend, everyone was friends. Jack and Alex were going to watch Home Alone, and Jack loved spending time with Alex. Alex was adorable and amusing and wonderful. Jack made Alex feel needed and wanted and alive, he made Alex feel happy. Jack and Rian treated him like a normal human being. The only other person who had done that was Tom.

Tom was standing outside in a rainstorm during the summer. Tom was falling asleep after a long day. Tom was hugging your favorite person to hug. Tom was seeing an old friend again, but acting as though the last time you saw them was only yesterday. Tom was a bright day after a hard night, Tom was laughing after crying, Tom meant everything. And Tom was gone.

So Alex cried into Jack's arms, wishing that Tom was still there.

After some time, Jack pulled back a bit and looked at Alex. His eyes were red and swollen, his eyebrows drawn and a heartbroken expression on his face. Alex's tearful eyes closed as Jack leaned forward and kissed him on the forehead.

"I'll take care of you. Don't worry."


	5. It's Beginning To Get To Me

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Zack returns and drama ensues.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Why were my chapters so damn short. Dear god.

Jack had experienced a long, tiresome week. Alex's parents hadn't wanted to stay home and make sure that their son was doing somewhat okay, so Jack took up that responsibility for himself. Jack took time making sure that Alex was eating, that Alex was seeing the light of day from time to time, and that Alex had someone to be there for him. Jack had come to terms with a habit that Alex had that consisted of biting the inside of his cheek with little intent to stop after he had started. Jack had found out about this when Alex had suddenly gotten up with what seemed like newfound energy after laying in Jack's arms all day long, and spat blood into the sink of his bathroom. Jack had stared in shock and panic that wasn't very well concealed. The bloody taste of his mouth had caused Alex to want to eat even less, and Jack hadn't had an easy time in trying to persuade him to eat. Alex claimed to not like either the taste of any food or the aftertaste of any food. Jack knew what it felt like to feel alone and not inspired to do anything , and he didn't want someone he cared about as much as Alex to feel like that. Yet it was getting so hard to make sure that Alex felt needed by someone. 

\-------

Alex woke up one morning feeling better. He didn't know why he suddenly felt better, but he woke with some sort of peacefulness inside his heart. Jack had left the blinds open that night, and soft white light floated in through the window. Alex gazed out the window and let his eyes adjust to the light, watching snowflakes softly twirl down in their individual little dances. His room, the place where he always felt safe, felt even more safe that morning. Alex felt like nothing could ever break through those baby blue walls and break him down again; he felt invincible. Glancing down at the soft bedspread hanging off the side of his bed, a small smile tugged at his lips as he saw Jack's sleeping form curled around a pillow.

Half of Jack's hair was flattened against the mattress, the other half of it looked all fluffy and soft. Alex wanted to pet Jack's stupid hair, but didn't want to wake up his friend. Jack always seemed so worried when he was awake, and Alex was happy to see a little smile on Jack's face as he dreamt of something much more peaceful than real life could ever be. But Alex was wondering if he could prove that wrong because at that moment, he felt more peaceful than he had ever been in his whole life.

\-------

Winter break in Baltimore had ended, but winter break in wherever-in-Hawaii-Zack-was had just began, and he was visiting Jack. When Jack was first informed of this, he felt excited. Of course, who wouldn't? His best friend who had basically left him for dead was coming back for a week just to leave him feeling even more lonely and useless than ever! After considering many things, Jack realized that he wasn't that excited about Zack visiting. Well, he was, but then he wasn't. Maybe this way he could find something to do with all the old clothes and random trinkets left behind by his "friend" that didn't involve burning them or throwing them into a ditch somewhere. In the few months that Zack had been gone, Jack had realized that Rian and Alex made much better friends than him. Rian cared about things other than himself and was always up for doing something that not only he wanted to do. Rian was caring and kind and had a nice smile. Alex was completely otherworldly and didn't even come close to how special Jack thought Zack had been to him.

Rian didn't have a problem hearing that Jack would probably be spending more time with his friend who was visiting, but Alex seemed to not be impressed. In fact, he seemed quite opposed to the idea that Jack wouldn't be diverting his full attention to him. With that in the back of his mind, Jack couldn't help but feel slightly guilty as he stood at the airport, waiting for Zack to appear. Jack was just on the verge of getting impatient when he felt fingers jammed into his side from behind, and he leapt back, whirling around.

"What the- oh! Hi!" Zack was standing in front of him, grinning.

"You doofus, you were waiting for the international flights."

"Shouldn't Hawaii count as international?"

"Whatever." Zack rolled his eyes, and smiled. The two left the airport, with Zack walking on Jack's right side, as he always did. As the two got into Jack's parent's old car, Jack felt like things were somewhat back in order. They sang along to Good Charlotte and mimicked Joel's voice while Jack drove them back home, and he had never been more happy to hear Zack's Joel Madden impression. He couldn't believe that he had ever been doubting if he wanted Zack back, he never wanted him to leave.

\-------

Alex was mad. Alex was also lonely, and Alex wanted Jack back. Rian was a reasonable human and knew that Alex was jealous, but didn't say anything about it. Lunchtimes had turned into something quite different than they ever had been, with Jack only talking about Zack while Alex pouted and Rian nodded along to the steady stream of words that nobody cared about, not even the person who was saying them. It was a half day, and Rian asked Alex if he wanted to do anything after school. He was met with silence from the whole table, and Jack didn't chime in for once.

"I'll just go home and eat mac n cheese and listen to Face To Face." Alex didn't say anything.

"I'm sorry, but Zack and I-" Jack started

"I know, I know." Rian rolled his eyes, and shot a glare across the table at Alex. Nobody said anything. Lunch ended at just the right time, and Jack found himself next to Alex once again, watching him mess with the combination lock on Zack's locker.

"Do I matter for a while and then suddenly I just don't?"

"What?"

"Nothing," Alex muttered, giving up on his combination and gave Jack well earned dirty look. Jack stood in the hallway thinking of what he had done wrong until the bell rang, marking that he was going to be late to class. Head still whirling, he dropped into his seat in Science class and tried to think. What had he done to make them mad? Couldn't they understand that his best friend was visiting, that he wanted to spend time with him? Why couldn't they just be happy for him?

This lead Jack into a whole new wave of thinking, and the streaky-haired boy disappeared into a sort of daze in the back of the science classroom. He thought of the look of disappointment on Rian's face and the way he waved Face To Face around in front of Jack, as if teasing him to ditch Zack and hang out with someone else for once. He thought of Alex's angry silence during lunch, the silence that only came when someone did something wrong. He had hurt Alex, hurt the boy who was such a work of art and viewed the world in such a different way. Jack hadn't known Alex for long enough to know completely how he "worked," but he could tell a lot from what he already knew about Alex. He viewed Jack in a different way. Jack valued and appreciated him so much, but didn't have a completely outright way to show it. Jack always thought it was the little things that counted. All the small things. That made Jack smile, and think of Zack once again.

Alex and Rian were going to have to deal with it. They were going to have to realize that Zack was Jack's best friend. They were going to live with a week and a half without Jack completely there, they were going to live with it.

\-------

Rian was missing, physically. Jack was missing, mentally. Alex was fully there, and fully aware that everything was going wrong again.

After walking home alone, Alex would walk into his dark house and miss Tom's presence. He missed everything about Tom. He missed his stupid jokes, he missed the nickname "Lex," he missed being someone's brother. Or half brother. It didn't even matter, Tom was gone. Alex's parents were hardly around, and they didn't give one fuck about Alex anymore. They were too busy mourning Tom, but didn't seem to realize that Alex might be feeling the same way as them. Sometimes Alex would cry because he missed Tom so much, sometimes he could cry because he wanted Jack back. Sometimes he would feel like all of his emotions were numbed. That was good, he liked feeling numb. There were some times where he felt so sad that he felt like dying, and he needed something to take away all of the sadness. That's what Tom was for, staying up until midnight talking on the phone and finding comfort in the steady light of the moon outside and the voice that promised that everything would be okay.

Nothing was okay.

Rian was gone and Jack didn't care. Alex was giving up and Jack didn't care.


	6. You Could Be Happy

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Trampolines save lives. Alex loses a scarf.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Giving up on summaries oh god. This is all better on Wattpad I'm only putting it up here because I'm desperate for people to read my crappy writing. Ha ha ha oh my god what is wrong with me.

The three lonely boys who had formed a hesitant friendship that had soon become steadfast were all alone once again.

Rian was at home wondering how he was so repulsive that his only two friends were these people who easily ditched him and forgot about him as soon as the opportunity came.

Jack was driving home from the airport and wondering why he had been so stupid and ignored his best friends and maybe-even crush, especially when they needed him. Good Charlotte was playing on without Zack's singing, and Jack wished that the boy had never visited. He found himself wanting Zack back more than he ever had; the scar of him originally leaving had been ripped wide open by him leaving again, and this time Jack wasn't going to try to stitch himself back up.

Alex was sitting in his cold bedroom, wishing that his brother was with him. He found himself wishing that more often than he'd like, but who wouldn't spend their time wishing their dead sibling was alive? Alex felt lonely without Jack, but he just wasn't aware of it. He knew that was was lonely and he knew that he was sad, he just didn't know that part of the problem was Jack.

Rian was sitting on his back porch, feeling a strong sense of worthlessness overwhelm him. It was too bright in his room, and he felt trapped when he turned the lights off. It was cold outside, frost and ice developing on the deck, but Rian felt numb and glad that he could breathe freely in the raw air. Yet even breathing was proving to be difficult at this point, and Rian felt like everything seemed to be collapsing around him. He hadn't take the liberty to show up at school for any of the past days, yet neither Jack or Alex seemed to notice or care.

That didn't feel good.

Nothing felt good, and Rian was wondering exactly why his friends could dispose of him that easily. Of course, the boy who Alex had ignored for the first week of school ended up being the only person he cared about, in the end. Jack had just abandoned both of them for some shitty friend who was just going to leave him in another week. It was growing colder by the minute, and Rian's whole body was going numb. He wished he could numb out all of his emotions, but it seemed like only his body was going to be drained of feeling.

At that moment, he wished nothing more than to not feel anything anymore.

\-------

Rian was missing. Jack was fully aware of this now, and was quite panicked over it. Alex was doing a magnificent job of ignoring Jack, and the two sat in a silence that was not ideal for the situation they were in.

"Alex, we need to find Rian. I'm worried." Alex replied with his usual reply, silence. Jack had forgotten how infuriatingly annoying Alex could be at times, and took a deep breath. He felt like Alex wasn't listening to him at all, not even hearing his words.

"Alex, listen. I'm sorry. I'm sorry that I didn't pay enough at- I'm sorry that I didn't, that I just... ditched you for a bit. It was lame, I'm sorry." Jack ran a hand through his hair, tilting his head back. "And you can ignore me if you want, but I'm gonna go look for Rian. Not saying you have to skip or anything. Just... I'm sorry." Alex put his head down, resting his head on his crossed arms, a surefire way of letting Jack know that he didn't give one single fuck about what Jack was saying. Jack stood up, and looked at Alex once more.

"I'm really sorry." Alex didn't reply.

\------

Rian had never had too many friends. Which was fine, because the adults said "quality over quantity" but that didn't mattered when there was no quantity and there was no quality. Besides, the adults were never right about anything. Maybe they were right when they said "two plus two is four," or when they said "a metaphor is a simile without the use of 'like' or 'as'," but other than things that were truly facts, adults gave shit advice and needed to fix their own problems before worrying about things that troubled teenagers. 

Rian had never felt downright like dying , but there had been times where he had come to the realization that he wouldn't be missed if he just disappeared. It was true, though. He never did anything to make his parents proud, he had never been anyone's first priority, he had never made someone truly happy, he wasn't important at all. And sometimes, in a fashion that was becoming more and more often, he was considering what would happen if he just... left. 

\------

A cold wind chilled the suburbs of Baltimore, and Alex was bundled in his gay-ass scarf and a jacket that was far too light for the bone-numbing weather. He didn't know where Jack was, and he had even less of an idea of where Rian could be. Alex was sitting in the grass on an empty lot, watching cars slowly drive by as he rubbed his hands together. Small flakes of snow drifted down from the slate grey sky, and frost gave the grass a crunchy feel. Alex blew on his hands, trying to think harder. Where was somewhere isolated around there that someone could go? Alex closed his eyes and tried to imagine his neighborhood. The only places that made sense that he could think of was the area near the dumpsters in the back of the elementary school and the train tracks. The train tracks seemed like the best bet, so Alex slowly got up off of the grass and set off down the street. He felt like he was slowly turning into an icicle, and rubbed at his arms to keep some sort of feeling in them. The wind was almost violent, and Alex wrapped his gay-ass scarf tighter around his neck. He would have to tell Jack about this, that his gay-ass scarf actually came in handy at times. There it was, the constant thought of Jack in his mind. No matter how hard he tried, he always ended up thinking back to what Jack would think of what he was doing, and that must be saying something.

Alex wasn't aware of how far he had walked until his already numb legs called out a protest, and he looked up to see the train-track crossing a few blocks ahead of him. Seeing the red and white striped posts looking so bright against the dull grey sky gave him newfound energy, and he sped up. Alex was actually quite worried at this point, and made his way down the train tracks a few steps before jogging down the hill on the side to where there was a small notch of soft grass headed by some evergreens. A gust of wind hit him all too hard, and he tripped over his own feet, ending up in a heap on the ground. Relief hit him more heavily than he expected it would when he heard the giggle of the one and only Jack Barakat. Alex got up, wincing at the sight of the grass stains on his knees and spat some dirt from his mouth. Jack was holding Alex's gay-ass scarf above his head with a triumphant smile on his face.

"It fell off."

"It protected me on the way here! You.. you donkey! Give it back!" Alex broke his long-lasting silence, which obviously had to bring Jack some relief, not that he showed it. Jack grinned, tossing the thing back into the air and watched it with careless ease as the wind caught the scarf and blew it away from Alex's greedily reaching fingertips. Rian, who was slumped next to Jack, watched the scarf with newfound interest. All three of them stopped and watched the bright turquoise piece of fabric disappear over the treetops and float away on to another life.

"That was my scarf," Alex said quietly.

"You've got us for warmth. We can huddle together like penguins," Jack offered. Rian rolled his eyes, and Alex stuck his tongue out at Jack. Then Rian let out a loud cough, and cleared his throat.

"I know where we can go."

\-------

The three boys made their way back past the train tracks and followed Rian down the grey, snow stained sidewalks. Rian was jumping around to keep himself warm, and smiled to himself when he glanced back to see Jack and Alex holding hands. The snow had tapered off to a few flakes swirling through the sky, and Alex was reminded of the first day of winter break when Jack had been catching snowflakes in his mouth and they had all been laughing.

And then Tom had died.

The thought was lost in Alex's mind and was replaced by confusion when Jack let out a loud squeal and broke into a run. They had passed by a park that couldn't properly considered a park because it was so small. There was a gate and then there was a patch of ground containing nothing except for a historical marker and a snow dusted trampoline. It was a huge trampoline, and Jack had thrown himself onto it without a care in the world. Alex stared in shock as Jack went flying in a cloud of snow, laughing so hard that he ended up back on the trampoline in jeans that were already soaking from the snow, wiping tears from his eyes.

"I haven't been on one of these in so long!" He laughed, sounding somewhat like a seal. Rian climbed up on the trampoline and jumped, heading straight for Jack. He flew over Jack, who had rolled away from the danger of Rian, and crashed into the net. Both of them were laughing now, and Alex reluctantly climbed up onto the edge of the massive trampoline. He jumped and landed at the same time as Rian, and both boys went flying backwards. Alex hit Jack, and the two crashed to the floor in tears. Everyone seemed to have forgotten about the sadness that had overcome them for a while, and let a trampoline take their worries away.


	7. Make This Go On Forever

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack and Alex are forced to go to a fancy party full of annoying people and olives. Rian gets a girlfriend. No, he doesn't. Does he?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HA cue the start of my good chapters that are over 2k words. From here till chapter 14 (last one aha) the chapters are going to be good. Enjoy!

Jake woke up with Alex curled in his arms. The first thought that came to him was the cold morning after Tom had died, when Jack had woken up the same way. Except that dreary morning, Jack hadn't felt Alex breathing steadily against him, and he had realized that Alex had been crying in his sleep and hadn't woken himself up. Jack had felt alone, trying to protect someone from the horrible things that the world could do.

This morning, Jack could feel Alex breathing against him, and instead of watery tear stains on his cheeks, a small smile graced his face. Jack was still thinking over his conversation with Rian yesterday. Jack had found Rian where Alex had found the pair later in the day, sitting in the trees near the train tracks. Rian's eyes had been closed, and he was sitting against a tree wearing nothing more than jeans and a t-shirt. There had been a sad excuse for a notebook with a torn up cover sitting next to him with a cheap black pen sitting on top of it. The pen was placed in the exact center of the book. Rian's skin was so pale. Jack had been terrified, and couldn't remember moving faster than he had at that moment. Rian hadn't replied when Jack had called his name, he hadn't even moved. So Jack had shaken Rian much more violently than he had intended to, and had been so relieved to find his friend alive, contrary to what other state he would have been in. Jack had stripped off his coat and given it to Rian, telling him to warm up, telling him that he was so worried about him, and apologizing because it was all he could do at that point. Rian had snatched up his notebook and held it close to his chest and provided Jack with a short, impaired tale of what had led him to the woods that freezing afternoon. Jack had held back his tears of helplessness and relief and made foolish promises that Rian knew he would break too soon. Alex had shown up, and Jack had been so happy and relieved that everything was somewhat okay when the trampoline came into the picture.

So Jack woke up with Alex in his arms, feeling warm and happy for once. After spending far too long on the trampoline, Rian had led them to a small shed which housed a space heater, a beanbag chair, and a lot of blankets. Rian had crashed on the beanbag chair and fell asleep right away. Jack and Alex had made a bed of blankets on the floor and drifted into sleep in each other's arms.

Rian was sitting on his beanbag chair, still wrapped up in Jack's coat. He was reading something out of his notebook, lips moving as he read silently. He didn't seem to notice that Jack was awake, and continued his reading. Alex shifted in Jack's arms, and sat up almost immediately with a bright smile on his face.

"I need to go home," he said earnestly, looking straight at Jack.

"Why is that?" Jack asked. Rian shut his book and stretched, waking up in the way that the rest of them were.

"Tom's going to be home. I know he is. I can't miss him. He might not stay for long." Neither Jack or Rian spoke, both of them holding breaths that they didn't even know they were holding.

"Um, how do you know?" Jack finally spoke, glancing at Rian who helpfully shrugged.

"I just do. I knew he would come back. Can we go home? Can I go home?"

"Of course you can. Is it alright if I come?" Jack asked delicately, knowing that Alex wasn't going to be happy when they got home.

"Yes," Alex whispered, almost to himself. "Yes you can." He got up, looking expectantly at Jack. Rian was still holding onto his notebook for dear life, and stared up at them. Jack stood next to Alex and shifted from foot to foot in the awkward silence.

"I think I'll stay here a little longer," Rian said in a hoarse voice.

"Are you alright?" Jack asked, still freaked out from the previous afternoon. He didn't feel so comfortable in leaving Rian alone, but wasn't sure if he'd want to deal with Alex's reaction to Tom not being there, to Tom never being there.

"I'm fine. Jack, I'm okay. Don't worry." Jack hesitated, then nodded.

"Okay." So Jack shut the door to the shed and left with his main priority, while Rian pulled Jack's coat tighter around him and went back to his note.

\-------

Alex was still trying to convince both Jack and himself that Tom was going to show up, he was just late. So as Alex sat on his bed on the verge of a meltdown, Jack comforted him while thinking about Rian. Jack felt guilty for being so worried about Rian, but had good reason to worry about his other friend as well. Alex wouldn't stop talking about Tom, and Jack had the shocking urge to scream in his face that Tom wasn't coming back. He didn't understand why Alex didn't get it, he wanted him to get it, he needed him to get it. Jack didn't want Alex to spend his whole life waiting for someone who was never going to return, because false hope wasn't something to hold onto for long periods of time, although far too many people did anyways and ended up somewhere off of the deep end, still holding onto the memory of something, or someone, who was never coming home.

"Alex," Jack said in a cracked voice.

"What?" Jack was about to speak, but then decided against his words. Nothing he said was going to help, because nothing he said ever helped. Alex never seemed to really get it. He didn't get that Jack was trying his best, and he didn't get that Tom was gone and he didn't get it at all. Jack saw Alex wince and open his mouth a bit, revealing blood-stained teeth.

"Alex-don't." Alex got up and walked to the bathroom, spitting blood into the sink. Jack followed him, feeling numb and emotionally drained.

"You need to stop that," he muttered weakly. Alex rinsed out his mouth, and looked back up at Jack.

"I want to go back to sleep. When I wake up, Tom's gonna be here. I know it."

"Okay." Jack was done putting up a fight, or trying to convince Alex that things were going to change. Jack's elbow slid off the side of the doorway and he stumbled over his own feet as he returned to Alex's room. Alex followed him, rubbing at his cheek.

"You should go."

"Sorry?"

"Leave," Alex said bluntly. Jack stared at him, trying to think if he had heard him correctly.

"Yeah... okay." Jack paused, hesitating on the edge of nothing. Alex was glaring at him and Jack felt a sinking feeling in his chest. He never seemed to be good enough, especially not to the people he wanted to impress or even help out the most.

"Sorry." Alex was emotionless, and didn't reply.

"I hope you feel better..." Alex was biting at his cheek again, and Jack reluctantly turned and made his way out of the room.

\-------

The next day at the lunch table, everyone was quiet once again.

Alex had woken up in the middle of the night and jumped out of bed to go looking for Tom. Once he hadn't found his brother in the house, he took the one thing his brother had left for him, a set of car keys that were meaningless seeing as Alex didn't know how or wasn't really keen to learn how to drive. He had unlocked Tom's car and slept in the front seat for the rest of the freezing night, wishing more than anything that Tom wasn't gone and that he hadn't asked Jack to leave.

Jack had come home to deal with his parents demanding to know where he had been. They hadn't seemed to take notice of how extremely sad their son looked, and grounded him for the next to weeks because of his "lack of consideration for their feelings," and Jack hadn't protested. His parents hadn't taken notice of his apathetic character either, and let him return to his room. May had tried to talk to him, but Jack hadn't been willing to talk to anyone. He had finally allowed himself to cry that night, wishing more than anything that Zack wasn't gone and that Alex hadn't asked him to leave.

Rian had slowly made his way home after reading and re-reading his suicide note. It was the most well-written thing he had ever created, and he found it a shame that no one else was going to get to read it anytime soon. Rian's parents had to be some of the best parents out there, so Rian did what Jack would be extremely proud of, and told his mom outright that he felt like killing himself. He didn't know what brought him to do it, maybe the fact that he could have died the other day and Jack was well aware of what was going on and maybe Rian wanted to make Jack feel reassured that he wouldn't be dying anytime soon. Rian's mom, thankfully, hadn't totally freaked out and had had a long conversation with Rian that actually made some sort of impact on him. That night, he had gone to sleep feeling much better than he had the previous day.

"You guys are coming over to this thing at my house this weekend," Rian said, breaking the silence that had been hanging around everyone.

"What is it?" Jack asked in a tired voice that didn't belong to him.

"It's one of my mom's fancy things that sometimes call for donuts. And my friend Cassadee is coming. Jack gave Rian a small smile that was a lot less than he would usually give Rian, but finished off the look with a wink and Rian found himself blushing slightly.

"I'll make sure to show up," Jack said, glancing at Alex, who was nodding in agreement.

\-------

Jack had always been bad at making good impressions. So when he realized that this was an occasion that was fairly important to Rian's mom, he decided to dress nicely. Nicely basically meant an untucked button down shirt and jeans, because Jack really couldn't get any fancier than that. Alex was wearing what he always wore, his grey jeans, green shirt and dark blue hoodie. Alex felt nowhere near underdressed as they walked in, because he simply couldn't care less. Everyone else had suit jackets and nice dresses, so Jack was eager to eat some speared olives and get the hell out of there. Alex and Jack had been introduced to Cassadee, a pretty girl with blondey brown hair, bright eyes, and a smile to match Rian's. Rian seemed absolutely infatuated with her, and never left her side for the 45 minutes that Alex and Jack managed to spend inside the house. At around 47 minutes spent enduring the company of other people, Alex's internal freak out about being forced to interact with so many people finally became too much to bear, and he voiced his unease to Jack. Jack had been relieved to hear this, because he had accidentally swallowed too many olive pits and wouldn't mind some fresh air at that point. The two escaped into Rian's backyard where they found nothing but an empty patch of grass. Jack had subtly been expecting a trampoline back there, but didn't protest in curling up next to Alex in the grass. Alex was appreciating the world at that moment.

"I love color," he breathed, turning to look at Jack.

"I love the color of the sky with all the stars up there and how it's a mix of navy and black and purple. I love how the stars don't have a color but there's still a color for them." Jack followed Alex's gaze back up to the clear sky. The stars were almost scarily visible, and Jack's eyes became constellations of mesmerization and beauty as Alex kept talking.

"And how the grass looks almost grey because the light is so dim and it's shadowed on one side by the darkness but the porch light makes the other side lighter. And how the porch light doesn't completely reach the very back of the yard but it can still let us see the colors. And how your shirt looks dimmer out here and it's a nice shade of blue but inside it looks like baby blue mixed with turquoise and it's hideous, but no, no it's not. Color can't be hideous. Color is so... color is so amazing." Jack didn't reply, and just looked around, trying to see what Alex was seeing.

"Look at me," Alex said in a quiet voice. Jack turned and met his gaze, and for once he forgot to smile when he saw Alex's face because he had never seen wonder like that in anyone's eyes before.

"Your hair is brown but it's also black but it's got blonde, and oh the way your face is shadowed right now, it's so beautiful. It's like someone drew you with extra shadows or outlined everything so much and it's unreal but no, it's so real, it's so real."

Alex's eyes had drifted down to Jack's lips, and then they were kissing and it was so real, it was so real.


	8. Set Fire To The Third Bar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A filler full of drama.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Who are Mayday Parade and why do they want me dead?

The next Monday, Jack felt fairly numb and quite shocked. His life kept going far up and far down and far up again, and he felt like this up would never ever end. What he didn't know is that this "up" would be brought back to earth far too soon. 

He had kissed Alexander Gaskarth. What he had first thought was some sort of crush had turned into full-fledged love, no matter how young or dumb it was. Jack and Rian were in math class, pretending to do a worksheet to convince the sub that they were actually trying to do some work, and talking to each other under their breaths. Rian had been going on and on about Cassadee, talking about how he hadn't realized how great she was and that he really just hadn't realized how great she was. Jack was happy about everything at that moment and smiled while nodding along to Rian's spiel, only half listening. In the middle of one of Rian's sentences, Jack interrupted him.

"I kissed Alex." Rian was still talking about Cassadee and took about ten long seconds to process the information he had just been given. Jack could have counted up to "ten Mississippi" before Rian blinked and turned to stare at Jack. 

"You what?"

"I kissed him. That night at your house. In the backyard. He's a good kisser, come to think of it." Jack had been thinking about it for three days straight and had only come to the "good kisser" conclusion about five minutes after they had actually kissed.

"You guys kissed?" Rian was still taking the time to process the information he had just been given.

"Yes."

"Whoa! Whoa! Wow! Okay, what? How did this happen? Explain." Rian had raised his voice and had received a poisonous glare from the sub. Jack glanced at his paper and scrawled down a few division symbols, some radicals, and an improvised version of the Angels & Airwaves logo.

"Okay. Okay. Okay, so. We went outside because those people your mom invited are snobs and don't talk about anything of interest. And it was hot. So we went outside and talked and I don't know, we just kissed." Jack spoke in a whisper, not wanting to get in trouble with their sub. The subs at their high school were treated with an utmost respect, simply because all of them wrote letters to the regular teachers regarding the behavior of their students. And the teachers sure as hell read those notes. Rian looked enthralled with Jack's tale, and leaned in. 

"Are you guys... like a thing?" That question made Jack slightly uncomfortable because he kind of did want to be part of a thing with Alex. But the thing was, Alex probably didn't want to be part of a thing with Jack, and Jack didn't like to dwell on that. He was depressing himself at this point, realizing that the kiss had probably been a one-time thing and that Alex would probably be fairly embarrassed to realize that Rian now knew about this. Jack shrugged, unknowingly looking slightly embarrassed himself.

"Do you like..." Rian trailed off, shaking his head. "It's like we're in middle school all over again. Do you like him like that?" Jack twisted up his face a bit, tearing at the skin on his chapped lips.

"Maybe? I don't know... kind of. He just doesn't like physical... contact and then bam we were kissing and- and I don't know. I don't know." Rian nodded, dawning a sort of philosophical look on his face. Rian was about to say something but was rudely interrupted by an insufferable popular kid named Craig.

"Jack!" He shouted, not hesitating to smack his hands down in a violent manner on Jack's desk. The sub had gone to the bathroom, and had probably forgotten about the class she was meant to be "teaching." Jack leaned back, directing a disgusted look in the boy's direction.

"Do you need something?" He asked, physically scooting his chair back to get away from Craig.

"You need to tell your retarded friend to leave me alone. He's always trying to take my notes and pencils and shit and trying to copy off of my work." Jack stared at him, deadly serious now.

"Who are you talking about?" He asked, knowing that Rian was sitting right next to him and the only other proper friend he had was Alex.

"The retard. Fucking- autistic one." Jack's expression fell into a glare, looking up to make not-at-all-awkward eye contact with Craig. Jack was completely aware that Craig was talking about Alex, but was quite unaware that Alex had autism.

"If you have a problem, take it up with him. I'm not his caretaker, he can talk to you himself."

"Do you think I haven't tried? He doesn't fucking talk!" Rian let out a loud sigh, rolling his eyes in exasperation.

"Why should I care?" Jack questioned, knowing that Rian was never one for drama and would probably move desks if this went on for too long.

"Because he only talks to you and Rian!" Before Craig could talk anymore, Rian finally spoke.

"Listen, don't call my friend a retard like that, for one. Two- move away from him if you have an issue. Have you not thought of that? And don't give me bull about assigned seats, tell the teacher that he's taking your shit and move. Lastly, there's something called dealing with your problems by yourself. Ever heard of it? Maybe you should go learn about it a little more. Now leave us, and Alex, yes he has a name, the fuck alone." Craig stared at Rian, obviously trying to think of something reasonably smart to say. Nothing seemed to come to his mind, so he just gave a semi-confused glare to Rian and walked away, muttering to himself.

"Some people need to know when to stop," mumbled Rian, cracking his neck. Jack nodded, directing his thoughts back to where they usually were, in Alex-land.

"Did you know he was autistic?" Jack asked, rubbing his eraser around on the paper to get rid of the graphite already on it. 

"Not really..." said Rian, who was now watching the clock quite intently. "It doesn't matter, though." Jack nodded, slowly gathering his things as the bell rang. He made his way out into the hallway, splitting up with Rian and making his way to his locker. Alex was waiting there. He had given up on trying to open his locker and waited for Jack to do it these days. Jack opened Alex's locker and then opened his own, lost in his need to think about something that shouldn't matter.

"What's wrong?" He asked Jack, closing his locker quite gently and turning to look at Jack.

"Nothing," Jack replied, too lost in thoughts, dedicating attention to things that shouldn't matter.

Alex was and had always acted weird, but Jack hadn't really properly actually thought about it but now he was busy asking himself how he had never noticed it before. Maybe it was the way that Alex was absolute shit with remembering facts and things, especially his combination. Maybe it was the way he barely spoke to anyone unless he was directly spoken to multiple times, or he was talking to Jack, Rian, or Tom. Maybe it was the odd way that he seemed to notice every single little detail about every single thing, and his obsession with the colors in everything. Maybe it was the way that he didn't understand death.

Alex was staring at Jack, trying to find out what was wrong.

"Jack," he said in almost a whiney tone. Jack shut his locker quite loudly, jumping at the sound himself. He wasn't even sure why this was such a big deal to him but then maybe it was the fact that he and Alex had kissed and neither of them knew what it meant or knew what it was supposed to mean and Jack just needed to breathe. He turned, setting off down the hallway with Alex following him.

"Are we walking?" Alex asked, his voice soft and apprehensive. Jack, Rian, and Alex walked home with each other every single day, and Alex was slowly coming to the realization that Jack didn't, in fact, want to walk with him. Jack didn't reply, giving Alex the answer he needed. Alex stopped at the door, deciding to wait for Rian. He watched Jack and his stupid spiky hair walk off, having no idea what chaos was flying around in his friend's head.

\-------

Zack was an asshole. Zack was, and had always been, an asshole, and Jack hadn't come to realize how much of an asshole he was until he was forcefully and obviously being an asshole. Jack had gone home with a sinking feeling in his chest, his heart screaming out that he really shouldn't have kissed Alexander Gaskarth, the boy with the beautiful hair and the fucking fantastic lips. So, like any rational person would, Jack went to Zack. Of course, he did, they were best friends, weren't they? Yet Zack wasn't acting like a best friend was supposed to, and had totally just gone on an insulting spree. Apparently, Jack was clingy and annoying and obviously shouldn't have kissed his friend because that was fucking idiotic because Jack was a complete idiot. Obviously.

So Jack told Zack to leave him the fuck alone and stuck his phone in a hard to reach the place between the wall and his dresser and locked his door and lay down on the floor and thought. He thought about the fact that he always liked Alex, he had liked him since day one. He had liked his pretty hair and the way he had blatantly ignored Jack for those first days of school. He had liked Alex when he had laughed at Jack slamming his hockey stick into the gym floor and god he had liked Alex when he finally spoke to Jack after they had run into each other in the hallway and Alex was crying and Jack had done a bad job at comforting him. Jack had liked Alex when they decorated the donuts and he had liked Alex during their paint-war. And when Tom had died, Jack felt like he was the only real thing that Alex could have held on to at that point. He was the one thing keeping Alex anchored to the real world, and he had had to like Alex through that long night and he had liked Alex the next morning when they woke up curled up in each other's arms. He had liked Alex when he had seen his friend's worried face and gay-ass scarf near the train tracks, and, man, he had liked Alex when they fell asleep together on the floor of Rian's shed. And in the end, hell, he had loved Alex that night in Rian's backyard when they were in some sort of happy daze with the colors of the world fresh in their minds and the taste of each other fresh on their lips.

\-------

Alex was sitting in the office of Miss Beatrice Emilia Lodonson, not talking. Usually, he would talk about everything, ranting about absolutely anything that had happened that day. Today, he was worrying Miss Beatrice Emilia Lodonson by not replying to anything she was saying and totally being lost in thought. He had gone back to the silence that had occupied him in the time before he had become Rian's friend, a silence that had totally taken over his life. After Jack had left suddenly and without an explanation of what Alex had done wrong, as it must have been something, Alex had been left second-guessing every action he made because man, he didn't want to let Jack down.

In the ample time that they had known each other, Alex had come to want to impress Jack at any chance he got. Even though Jack didn't need to be impressed by anyone, and not Alex by any means, Alex still felt like he had to make Jack interested in him and feel like he was getting something good out of their friendship. But they had kissed each other and Alex didn't know what to think and Jack didn't know what to think and god, they were fucking infatuated but both were thinking that they have had to have done something wrong for this to happen.

But they hadn't, and Jack was lying on his floor overthinking his life and Alex was ignoring the one person who was actually there and trying to help him.

"If you're not going to talk, then I guess we're done," Miss Beatrice Emilia Lodonson said, starting to stand up. She glanced at Alex as if waiting for him to change his mind and say something. He didn't, and kept his head down.

"I'll see you on Wednesday, okay?" Alex didn't say anything and waited for her to walk out of the room before he moved. Wincing at the taste of blood in his mouth, he made his way down the stairs, not pausing to look at anyone in the waiting room. It wasn't as cold as it usually was outside, and that was good because Alex was going to go get lost. And Alex didn't know what he meant by thinking of getting lost, but Tom's funeral was on Friday and he knew that he wasn't going to be able to deal with it well and he felt like everything was falling apart all over again.

The only thing that Alex really needed, or wanted, was Jack, and Jack seemed to be the thing that was fucking everything up.


	9. Headlights On Dark Roads

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jack and Alex go and laugh over stupid things.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is my second favorite chapter go and enjoy.

Things were fucked up again. Things were always fucked up, and Jack had a plan that might involve fixing some part of his problems, and, as always, his plan involved Alex. The students had been granted a four day weekend due to teacher work days, and Jack's plan revolved around the two extra days of freedom that he had been granted.

Jack was walking down the street, quite happier than he had been in quite a while. Of course, he had been happy the night where him and Alex had kissed, but that happiness hadn't lasted very long, and this wave of optimism had lasted him almost a full day. It was Saturday, and Jack was almost skipping down Alex's street, stupidly expecting his friend to be at home. He hopped up the stairs to Alex's house and rang the doorbell, expectantly rocking up and down at his feet. After the door wasn't answered, Jack was left with the awkward decision of whether to wait for someone to open the door, or to ring the bell again. Alex's car wasn't in the driveway, and then Jack remembered.

Tom's funeral was today. Jack had been expecting it to be sooner, but no, it was today and Alex really hadn't wanted to go. He had mentioned it on Friday with a somber attitude, obviously not wanting to go honor the death of the single most important person in his life who had been there for him until the day he died. Jack knew that Alex was going to be a wreck by the time he got back from the service, so Jack came up with the great idea of sitting down on Alex's lawn and waiting for him and his parents to return.

\-------

It took a while. It took more than a while, but Jack didn't mind. The weather was nice, and Jack was trying to look fairly inconspicuous while lying in the sunshine on Alex's lawn. Spring seemed to be arriving much quicker than Jack had expected it to, and he was welcoming the warmer weather. As he thought over his plan again, Alex's car pulled up to the curb outside of his house. The first person out of the car was Alex himself, stumbling over his own feet. He looked like he was trying to get out of the car as fast as possible, and headed towards Jack as soon as he saw him.

"Let's go," he muttered under his breath, grabbing Jack's hand. He kept his head down, his long hair falling over his face. Alex's parents took no notice of their son walking down the street with Jack, so Jack didn't question if they wanted him back that night. Something was obviously wrong, though Jack had no idea what.

"Alex, are you alright? What's happening?" Alex walked even faster without replying, tugging on Jack's hand like a little kid trying their best to get their way. They walked for a while longer, not surprisingly ending up in the woods behind a small building complex. When finally Alex turned his face up to look at Jack, he had been walking in front of him for most of the time, Jack saw the bruise on his face.

But it was more than just the bruise and his split, swollen lip. Alex looked exhausted and worn out; his skin looked almost grey. There was a sort of sadness hanging over him, a sadness that would make sense for someone who had just come back from their brother's funeral. He wasn't dressed in his usual clothes, instead he was wearing an oversized ugly green button-down shirt and a navy suit jacket that didn't match whatsoever. He wore grey dress pants, and Jack realized that he had tried to replicate his normal clothes with dull clothing of a fancier variety, yet Jack didn't realize what kind of fight he had to put up with his mother to let her allow him to wear the messy ensemble. Alex's hair seemed dull, the colors that Jack had first been so mesmerized with faded.

Yet, the thing that Jack really thought was the biggest problem was the darkening bruise on his friend's face.

"What happened? Jesus christ, Alex, what the fuck happened? Did someone hit you? Are you-"

"Stop," Alex said, sounding overwhelmed. The only thing he had said to Jack since he had seen him was "let's go," and Jack hadn't realized how choked up his friend had sounded. Jack shut up, biting his lip nervously and rubbing Alex's hand. Finally, Alex spoke.

"I was being stupid, so I got hit. I deserved it. Don't make a big deal out of it." Jack was going to make a big deal out of it, because his parents were kind and smart people who had raised him to say what he did next-

"You don't deserve to be hit by anyone. Christ. You can't go around fucking punching people at a funeral. Or ever. God." Alex turned his head away, and Jack could see that he wasn't going to listen to any of the words out of Jack's mouth.

"Can you leave it alone?" He asked quietly, his voice a mumble.

"Yeah, fine." Jack breathed, thinking of how to casually bring up his plan. "Want to go somewhere?" Alex looked up at him, his face almost expressionless.

"Can I borrow some of your clothes?"

\-------

They had been driving for about two hours, and Alex had fallen asleep in the passenger seat of Jack's parent's old car, his body curled up against the window. He was wearing one of Jack's old shirts, a dark green New Found Glory one that was faded beyond belief. He was wearing black-ish grey jeans that were too long; the ends fell down around his beaten up Converse that he had somehow gotten to wear to the funeral. However, his navy hoodie wasn't with him, so he had just kept the suit jacket. It looked kind of ridiculous, but Jack wasn't going to complain.

Jack wasn't really sure about where they were going, all he knew was that he wanted to get away from the rest of the world, and that Alex did too. So when Jack got to the point of feeling extremely lonely and craving Alex's attention and honestly just wanted to see his smile, he rolled down the window.

Alex jerked awake immediately, letting out a yell that was mixed with a laugh when he realized that he was okay, and Jack had just been acting stupid, as usual. Though after pulling away from the open window, he pulled back to it, glancing up. Jack, who was busy driving, didn't have the best view of the stars and wasn't really aware of what was happening until he glanced over and noticed Alex climbing out the window of the car. Gasping and scarily swerving across the road, Jack started yelling.

"Alex what the fuck are you doing?!" Jack was panicking, glancing between Alex and the road.

"Calm down," Alex replied, shaking his hair out of his eyes and smiling. "I'm just getting a good view. Don't worry." Jack had inadvertently sped up when he realized that his crush was climbing out the window of his car, and Alex was enjoying the breeze in his hair.

Alex had always liked climbing. He liked rock climbing, he liked climbing trees, he liked climbing ropes, and he especially liked climbing on top of cars. Not that he had climbed on top of cars too many times in his life, and he wasn't planning on climbing on top of Jack's, not by any means.

Alex wouldn't say that he felt infinite, knowing that that would be too much of a cliche. Yet whatever he was feeling definitely wasn't far from the endless tales of "invincible" or "limitless." The cold wind snatched Alex's breath, and what he had left of the air in his lungs was used for laughter.

There were good kinds of laughers and bad kinds of laughers. The bad kinds laughed at all the wrong moments, and had obnoxious laughs that sometimes made other people cringe when they heard it. The good kinds of laughers had laughs that weren't too loud or too soft. Their laughter made others want to laugh, and that's just what Alex's laughter was doing to Jack.

Even though Jack had a nagging worry that his friend was going to fall out of the window and die, he attempted to push that thought to the side as he drove. Alex's loud, almost spur of the moment laughter was torn away from his lungs by the biting wind that somehow seemed to be so jealous of Alex's ability to laugh. The sound of Alex's happiness made Jack giggle even more, and that was just the beginning.

Yet Jack had no idea that Alex had reached an ethereal point in which he, perhaps admittedly, felt like one of the stars; a shining, infinite object that burned so bright. So he laughed with the sky, stars the color of fool's gold providing insignificant glaze to actually light up his face, but enough to outline his silhouette. If he had turned his face towards Jack, it would have been too dark to make out his split lip and bruised eye, and Alex's had forgotten about them as much as the light had. Jealous wind blew his hair back from his grinning face, and he felt like he could go on forever, just him and the distant thought of Jack, alone under a pyrite sky.

Dropping back into his seat as Jack spun the steering wheel, Alex's wind bitten cheeks spread in a wide smile. Jack returned the expression, and finally seemed to relax as Alex started talking about color, as he usually did. Jack's surroundings became more familiar, knowing that they had reached a private park that wasn't owned by the state, wasn't open after dark, and didn't favor cars driving on roads that were reserved mainly for maintenance vehicles, and vehicles that were actually allowed to be there. Yet, that seemed to slip his mind as he parked at the top of a hill that he recognized, and brought back fond memories of spending a night that had seemed to end all too quickly under those same stars. And Alex had been talking about those stars for the last 10 minutes of their drive. As soon as Jack got relatively close to stopping the car, Alex hopped out of the car and let out an amazed gasp right away that he did nothing to try and hide. Not short of breath but perhaps lacking in the air to supply the words about his unrealistically bright the stars were, and how fucking hard his heart was beating.

Turning his bruised but bright face towards Jack, who for reasons Alex didn't completely understand, was staring right at Alex. Almost as if called on by the possibility of wishing on falling stars, or simply just lacing their barely shaking fingers together, their legs brushed through long grass; Alex fascinated with the stars, Jack fascinated with Alex. Almost desperate for another kiss, Jack took Alex's hand. Pulling him closer, Jack began to laugh as Alex joined both of their hands. Pulling his weight back and bracing his feet in the dirt, he began spinning, already giggling with only semi-non understandable laughter. Jack spun with him, twisting his feet around in the dewy grass. Alex's blurring face and escalating giggles finally caught up to Jack, and then he started laughing. The spinning and the fact that they were just there, with each other, under the sparkling stars seemed like completely perfect reasons to be laughing. So Jack broke out of the spin and doubled over laughing as Alex immediately tripped and fell over. Alex rolled onto his black, howling with laughter. Jack had fallen to his knees, his stomach hurting so much that he couldn't stay standing up. Alex rolled over onto his stomach, laughing into the grass. Jack, for some reason, was trying to get back up, and was having a hard time doing that. So when Alex sat up, his hands wrapped around his stomach, with grass stuck to his forehead, Jack lost it.

He staggered back, tripping over his own feet and falling against the car. The car alarm went off, and so did another bout of hysterical laughter from both of them. Alex fell back over, his infectious laugh echoing through the air. Trying as hard as he could to catch his breath, Alex glanced back up at Jack, who was laying across the hood of the car, laughing as hard as Alex had ever seen anyone laugh, fumbling with his car keys and jumping each time the car alarm shrieked into the air. Alex pulled himself back to his feet, and stumbled over to Jack. The car alarm finally died, and then it suddenly was far too silent. The laughter that had been filling the silence for the past minutes had disappeared, and Alex and Jack were left staring at each other, both leaning against the hood of the car. Jack leaned the tiniest bit forward, and whatever hint he had been trying to send out, Alex got it.

Jack's hand found itself on the side of Alex's face, pulling him closer. Their lips were locked together, and Alex turned his head, moving himself closer to Jack. So they kissed, lips moving against each other, bodies pressed up against each others. To Jack, Alex tasted like blood, apples, and the wind. Almost as if unaware of it, Alex rocked his hips up against Jack. The feeling running through Jack's body was fucking bliss, and all he could think of was how Alex was like a nebula. His hair glittered and shone like clouds in space, his eyes were the lustful swirls of planets, his lips were comets, burning against Jack's, he breathed stardust.

They kissed like falling stars.


	10. Open You Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Absolute beauty and wonder. Best chapter in this story. Read it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm seeing Melanie Martinez live in less than 48 hours and I love this song and this chapter is good good good good I love this chapter please enjoy!

Everything was on fire.

Not literally, but Alex's mind registered the bright orange burst of sunlight brimming over the horizon as fire, and he didn't hesitate to start telling Jack exactly what he thought about the colors streaking across the sky. Alex loved color, and it had become extraordinarily obvious to the other thing he loved. Well, this thing was actually a person who was named Jack Barakat who was sitting criss-cross-applesauce (something that Jack hadn't heard for ages that Alex had said the other day which struck him as fucking adorable and amazing that he still remembered the kindergarten phrase) on the hood of his parent's old car, sitting up tall and watching the sky with bright eyes that were far too awake for the very sleepless night he had endured.

Before the sun had made its long awaited (or maybe not really, Jack and Alex hadn't had the worst of nights) arrival, the sky had been a lavender purple color that had turned a reddish pink, the purplish color that matched the hickey on Jack's neck, the reddish pink that matched the color of Alex's lips.

But their early morning daze of color and love hadn't necessarily been ruined by the rising of the sun, it had just distracted Alex, and then they were back to discussing the color of the sky, which wasn't a bad thing either. Jack loved listening to Alex talk. Alex was always so careful with his words, choosing exactly the right ones to describe what he was seeing, and Jack got lost in the way he spoke all of the words, emphasizing some of them, letting others flow together in a huge collection of brilliance.

Alex looked more adorable than usual, if that was even possible, that morning. His hair was messy, sticking out on the right side but flattened against his head on the left. Due to the cold morning air, his face was pale, but two wild roses of color bloomed in his cheeks. The bruise around his eye hadn't magically disappeared overnight, and still hung there on his face as some sort of cruel reminder that they weren't going to be watching the sunrise on the hood of Jack's car forever, and that the real world still existed. Alex's lips were only slightly swollen, the soft pink color of them only disturbed by the black scab of where his lip had been cut against his teeth when he had been hit the previous day. He sat with his knees drawn up to his chest, arms wrapped around himself, only sometimes sliding down the hood of the car. The blue blazer from the funeral was still hanging off of him, giving him a form of sweaterpaws that Jack would laugh and call "blazerpaws" if he felt allowed to break through Alex's words about comparisons to how the orange sky was a lot like the 365 days that humans, like Alex, considered a year on the planet of Earth.

So Alex finally trailed off when the sun rose higher, and he and Jack sat and watched the colors of the sky change drastically in an eerily short amount of time. Jack couldn't stop smiling because he was just so happy. There had been too much drama, too many mistakes, too many things gone wrong and everything just seemed so right right then. But as the uncharacteristic colors of the sky faded into a trademark blue, Jack regretted to tell Alex that they should probably be heading back home.

"Y'know, people will probably be wondering where we are," Jack told Alex. Alex giggled a tiny bit, bringing back memories of their laughing attacks the previous night.

"We didn't tell anyone where we went, did we?" Jack shook his head, and Alex took another glance at the sky. "I guess we should probably head back." The two slid off of the hood of the car, and Alex remembered how ridiculous Jack had looked as he had lain there the previous night, bouncing every time the car alarm went off, and laughing like he was never going to laugh the same way again. And then how awfully un-ridiculous he had looked later into the night, and god did Alex feel happy.

Jack began to drive, and when Alex rolled down the window Jack asked for him to just let him know if he was going to climb out of the window and Alex laughed and said: "maybe later." He just let the air rush in the window, teasing at his hair and pulling a content smile on his face. Everything was finally going right.

\-------

Jack and Alex had bought donuts because breakfast was the most important meal of the day and donuts were completely acceptable breakfast foods. They had been in the shop when Jack had whispered "what if you stuck your dick through a donut?" in Alex's ear and Alex had burst out laughing and had had to cover his mouth because people were looking at them and then Jack had gotten pink icing on his nose but Alex didn't tell him to get rid of because it was dreadfully adorable.

While Jack continued the drive back home, all he could think about was how much he wanted to be "part of a thing" with Alex Gaskarth. And he supposed there was another term for it, maybe what he was trying to say was that maybe he wanted to date Alex Gaskarth or have Alex Gaskarth be his boyfriend. Yet Jack didn't know how he would end up being "part of a thing" (a term he really couldn't get out of his vocabulary) with Alex Gaskarth because he was lacking the confidence he needed to ask him out. Little did Jack know, Alex was thinking the exact same thing except that he felt more confident than Jack did about the subject. Both of them were both eager and unenthusiastic to reach Alex's house, and as Jack made the turn onto Alex's street, one of them made a decision. Jack walked Alex to his front door and was about to bid his friend farewell until Alex cut him off.

"Um," he began, which is always a good way to lead off an important question or sentence, "would you maybe... uh, I don't know, like to... be my..." Alex trailed off and Jack felt a feeling that was excitement on LSD fill his chest. "...boyfriend? Y'know, so we can kiss more and not be worried about what it really means." Alex's explanation for the question was almost more adorable than his blushing, nervous face. Jack had known the question was coming but in turn also hadn't and of course one of them had had to ask the question after the previous night and Jack stared and Alex's face and tried to think of what to say in the situation and there was a word for it and the word was-

"Yes. Yeah. Yes, yeah, I would like to." Jack stuttered out, grinning at his boyfriend. Boyfriend. The two stood in an only semi-awkward silence before Jack began voicing his worries about getting in trouble with his parents and Alex said that he probably should go let them know that he was fine but Alex stopped Jack before he could go and leaned forward, rocking up on his tiptoes. He kissed the tip of Jack's nose, tasting the sweet frosting in his mouth. Jack laughed, grinning so much that Alex began to worry if his face might explode or something.

"I... I'll see you later. Boyfriend," Jack said, wanting to do anything but see Alex later. He wanted to see Alex now, and never not see him.

"Have a great day... boyfriend," Alex replied.

Boyfriend.

\-------

Alex was sitting in the office of Miss Beatrice Ruth Lodonson and not hating being there for once. Alex didn't think he could hate anything ever again at the state he was in, and couldn't stop smiling and couldn't stop giggling and the blush on his cheeks wasn't ever going to leave and that Sum 41 song was still playing on the radio and he and Jack were still laughing under the stars and maybe it didn't matter that they weren't there anymore but they were together, together even if they were apart and Alex couldn't concentrate on anything but the thought of his boyfriend.

Miss Beatrice Ruth Lodonson had relaxed into a comfortable conversation with Alex, something completely different than their usual standoffish conferences that weren't arguments but came off far too cold to be healthy. But Miss Beatrice Ruth realized that something had happened to Alex and it wasn't the bruise around his eye or his split lip, that it was something completely different and she asked about it and his response was one word and that one word could explain everything.

"Jack."

Because maybe Miss Beatrice Ruth didn't have to know everything that had happened between Alex and Jack but she had heard enough about it over the past few months but she could see it in Alex's eyes and hear it in Alex's words and she had known that it would turn out this way from the start. Because things had started out shaky yet all that Alex had ever wanted to talk about was Jack Barakat and perhaps he didn't know how to show his emotions for this other kid properly but he had gotten them out somehow and now he was happier than Beatrice had ever seen him.

And although worry was the first thing she felt when he had shown up that day with signs of a fight clear on his face, his demeanor was something completely different than what the discolorations on his face might suggest, and he talked to her so openly and happily and he seemed like a completely different person. So everything seemed alright and it kept seeming alright for Alex until he got out of "therapy" or "counseling" or whatever the fuck it was called, to have an angry, frustrated, and not really alright spam of texts from Jack that ended off with "ignore all of this." Alex looked around for Tom's car and caught himself before he could start worrying. Instead of walking home the same way he always would, he found himself on an unfamiliar sidewalk that somehow lead to the house of Jack Barakat.

\-------

Jack was upset and Alex was trying to remind him that he wasn't going anywhere and maybe Zack was going somewhere and maybe that somewhere was to the land of extremely shitty bad friends but the land of shitty bad friends wasn't somewhere Alex belonged and Jack knew it. Alex was sitting on Jack's bed, talking. He was good at talking, he realized. He was either good at being silent or talking too much, and there was absolutely no in between but that was just another thing that Jack loved about him and Jack just wished that he could tell Alex how he felt about him but he really didn't know how so he just listened and tried not to start crying again because Alex was magic. Because Alex was there saying things like, "if people can't hurt me then people sure can't hurt you and maybe I can't get rid of everything that makes you hurt but maybe I can get rid of the hurting," and anyone who says anything like that is especially magical and Jack was wondering why on earth he of all people was blessed with the gift that was Alex Gaskarth.

Jack had been drowning, he had been gasping for breath and thrashing and twisting and going deeper and deeper down and his life raft had been four feet away, standing at a locker way less than four feet away, a life raft with pretty hair that didn't talk and had beautiful lips that were the colors of flowers in the springtime who smelled like apples and tasted like the wind and crossed those four feet as soon as he could and the only thing that Jack had lost was the tiniest amount of his sanity and the only thing that Alex had lost was his gay-ass scarf but Jack had gotten his life back before he had drowned and Alex had gotten to save someone's life.

And maybe someone had lost their life along the way and maybe someone else had almost lost their life but no one was going to forget Tom and no one was going to let Rian go and Alex was the sexiest life raft in the whole damn world and every bad thing that had happened was just debris pushed to the side and ready to be cleaned up and every good thing that had happened was right there on Alex's tongue and every story was filling Jack's heart and he was going to cry because he was the luckiest kid on earth because he had a boyfriend who doubled as a life raft who had spring on his lips and fall in his hair and a tongue that spoke winter and summer and a heart that felt all four at once and maybe an added season that was experienced somewhere on Mars but Jack knew nothing about space and Alex knew nothing about life rafts or metaphors that went on for far too long but all the two knew was that they were in love with each other and that's all they needed to know, because it was all they needed to keep them going.


	11. The Finish Line

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Both Rian and Alex go crazy. Astro-turf is really hot.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hit 700 reads on Wattpad with this story hECK  
> Also I'm demolitioniero on there and the cover is nice on there and I mean it's better on there overall I'm desperate someone get me to 1k.

Rian Dawson was really worried. 

The main cause of this worry was school, because school causes everyone to worry at some point or another but tests and projects and the lingering intimidation of exams in the near future were keeping him awake at night, and he felt lonely again because his best friends were dating, as he had suspected them to, and now had their attention fully dedicated to each other. And Rian didn't want to sound like a whiny middle schooler but he felt only the tiniest bit of anger towards Jack for taking Alex and all of his attention. Alex had been Rian's friend first. They had actually had conversations, they had hung out, they had enjoyed their time together and then all of a sudden Jack had stuck his head in and Alex didn't seem to want to dedicate any attention to Rian anymore. So, no, Jack hadn't stolen Alex but Alex was pretty much gone and Jack was cool, of course he was, but dear god Rian wished that he had friends of his own. He wished that he had people who willingly wanted to spend time with him, people who wouldn't totally abandon him for their crushes, people wouldn't who know that he was falling apart and completely ignore him after one conversation about how he felt.

Rian needed proper friends.

But he didn't know how to make them, and he had Cass but Cass wasn't someone he wanted to discuss his emotions with because he was trying to make a good impression on her. So while he was busy trying to get Cass to like him, every insecurity that he had been trying to leave behind was making a reappearance and he could pretend like he wasn't feeling suicidal again but he really was and he just felt bad.

So he sat in silence at the lunch table that always seemed to be where he felt the worse. Jack and Alex were giggling about something or other with their faces so close to each other that Rian was wondering how they could even see each other. Jack said something that sent Alex into a laughing mess, which caused Rian to realize that if he needed help, he needed to ask for it. It was obvious that neither of his friends were going to provide any assistance, so he decided to talk to Jack at the end of the day.

Which he did.

Jack had been waiting by Alex's locker as he always did, since Alex couldn't open it. Alex hadn't shown up yet, so both Rian and Jack opted to think that a teacher had just wanted to talk to him about something or other. Nervous but ultimately knowing that he was doing the right thing, Rian took a deep breath and approached Jack, tapping him on the shoulder.

"Oh, hey! What's up?" Jack asked, his tone light hearted, reflecting the opposite of Rian's mood.

"Um. I need to talk to you," Rian muttered, already feeling that whatever he was trying to do was the wrong thing and that he would be fine dealing with his problems by himself.

"You're talking to me. Continue," Jack said, laughing at himself a bit but Rian wasn't in the mood for laughter and his idea had been that he didn't need to talk about wanting to kill himself in the hallway where many other students and teachers were hanging about.

"No, like... not at school. Somewhere else." Jack hesitated, and Rian knew what the answer was going to be so he automatically found himself backing away from the conversation.

"I need to wait for Alex..." Jack said apologetically, backtracking as soon as the words left his mouth. "No, but, are you okay? Is it serious?" Rian felt hurt and already not good enough. He was always second, never anyone's first priority. The sadness was building up in his chest and for a moment he thought he was going to start crying, which would show that he was even weaker than he thought. Jack had realized that it was, indeed, a serious situation, and had much more concern etched into his face than Rian found the need for, but then he was following Jack out of the building and feeling for once that he had done something right. So Jack sat him down in the grass at the edge of one of the fields behind the school and asked what was wrong, and then Rian spoke.

"I know it sounds selfish, I know, but..." Rian stopped because once he had heard that suicide was the most selfish thing that anyone could do and then the tears were really coming and he was wiping at his face and Jack was trying to say something but it was all mixing together and Rian had covered his face with his hands but the words came out, "-feel really worthless." Rian had always thought that the word "worthless" was so sad. The definition was "having no real value or use," and Rian felt that way because no real value meant that people could try to give whatever was being labeled worthless value, but it wouldn't work because if something became worthless then there was really no way to restore it or bring it back to reaching any sort of importance. Jack had stopped talking, and was just sitting there, not knowing what to do or say. "Rian, Rian, listen. You're not worthless at all. You have people who care about-" Jack was cut off when Rian decided to finally get everything off of his chest; he had removed his hands from over his face and his teary eyes were red-rimmed and burning with frustration.

"Yeah, I have like three people who care about me and whatever "care" that is, you know, it's a really- fucking- lowkey kind of care like- "I guess I care about him." Rian was crying unmindfully now, hot tears dripping down his face as he glared at Jack.

"I know I've been spending too much time with Alex, listen, I- I'm sorry I haven't been checking up on you I am-"

"Then why haven't you?!" Shouted Rian, pulling his hands up to his face as his breaths shuddered out. "You've been over there making out with Alex while I'm here wanting to fucking kill myself and you're saying that you should have checked up on me but when was that going to happen? Because you really weren't hinting at ever making sure that I was alright!" Rian covered his mouth with his hand again, knowing that he had said all that he needed to say and anything else would just make everything worse. Rian hardly raised his voice, and was usually a very calm person but there seemed to be no other way to get anything into Jack's head at that point without screaming at him. 

"I'm sorry." Began Jack. And Rian knew that he was truly sorry because of the way his voice was shaking and his eyes were regretful and Rian almost wanted to forgive him right there and then but that wasn't going to happen so instead he just sat and waited for the apology he deserved, still wiping at his face and trying to disregard the fact that he had just been crying in front of Jack.

"Listen, Rian, okay. I've been spending too much time with Alex, and I've been fucking... ignoring you and that's bad and that's not right and I'm sorry, I really am. And you can't think that you're worthless because you're so good and nice and smart and we've had a shit ton of fun with you and, and, oh god you're just really important. And god, remember the donut decorating and the paint balloon fight and the trampoline, the trampoline and this isn't helpful but do you know that one of Alex's favorite memories was that one day when you guys went down to the Visionary Art Museum and rolled down that hill and played chess?" Jack's choppy speech was ended off in a question, and he was obviously searching for anything and everything to make Rian feel better, but the last words that he had spoken had made Rian feel better because-

"Really? How do you know?" That made him feel even more like a little kid, asking stupid questions to make sure that Jack knew what he was talking about, which he did but after all, Rian needed something to keep him going.

"Yeah, he told me." That made Rian feel even better to think that Alex had actually enjoyed it that much to tell Jack about it, and he hung his head and wiped at his eyes, feeling ridiculous and stupid and exactly like he wasted Jack's time.

"Can you stay at my house sometime?" Jack asked, because he was worried about his friend and he actually needed to start paying attention, and then smiled when Rian nodded and he knew that he had to start making more of an effort to care about people other than Alex, he really did.

So while Jack and Rian were working out their problems on an astro-turf smattered field that was actually really fucking hot but neither of them mentioned it because it didn't seem like a big deal compared to what the other topics were to discuss, Alex was standing outside his locker, trying not to have a breakdown that he was honestly going to have whether he liked it or not.

The day had been going fine, no it had been going much better than fine because he had a boyfriend and nothing was going wrong for once but next thing he knew he had been sitting in the principal's office while ripping his shoelaces apart because it was a better alternative to the inside of his mouth. So then the principal and this teacher who had idiotically taken time out of their days to talk to him had sat him down in a smelly office with too-bright lights that made him feel sick and then they had talked to him. Most of what they said went straight through his head and didn't make any impact on him, but then they were asking him to do something he didn't want to do. So he said that he didn't want to. But of course, nothing was as easy as "I don't want to," and then their words overlapped because they were obnoxious and didn't talk patiently and normally and Alex's head was hurting and they were asking him to do something about math because he was exceptional at math, extremely exceptional, obviously gifted in that subject, but then he had gotten confused because both of them were talking rapid fire at him and nothing made sense. And then the teacher who wasn't the principal said something about how something was wrong with his head and Alex had ripped his shoelace in half and then everything had gone wrong.

Tom had taught him how to curse. Tom had cursed all the time and Alex had picked up on the words as he grew up, especially when he grew up having to talk to counselors and therapists who were mature and professional and talked like adults; not like other kids his age and certainly not like Tom. So Alex hadn't spoken to the people that he was meant to talk to, and spoke to the people he wanted to talk to using words that weren't big or fancy, using words that he understood and he was able to shape with different forms of grammar. And as he grew older, cursing had become more natural to him because Tom had been doing it more often and kids around had started doing it more often and his parents did it more often than anyone else. So he would sit on his bed at night and try to do some of his work and listen to them fight, listen to them fight over things that didn't matter to anyone but them, because they were selfish and rude and Alex knew it was rude to curse and made people look stupid and if cursing made you look stupid, then Alex's parents were the most laughable morons in the whole world.

But that day in the principal's office, Alex hadn't really panicked, but he had said no plenty of times to what these two men who worked in the education system but really seemed to have no idea how anything worked, Alex lost all his respect for figures of authority.

So he cursed. He cursed and he raised his voice and he had moved his shoe and ruined shoelace from his knee and set it back onto the floor and he stood up and made his way towards the door after he was done with his spiel but he was called back by one word that got through to him before he could go.

"Suspended."

Everything else was background noise to the blur in the back of his head, but he spun around and now he really was panicking. The principal looked smug and the teacher looked plain stupid and both of them were staring at Alex.

"We'll be calling your parents to let them know that you're going to be enjoying an in-school-suspension on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday next week." The teacher nodded along to the words of the principal because he didn't have anything else to add because he was stupid and didn't know anything.

Alex had obviously been excused, and stumbled out of the office with his breath hitching up and his feet tripping over themselves because his shoelace was ripped so he had three laces dangling instead of two and his whole body started shaking. Not knowing where else to go, he went to his locker as a desperate attempt to see if Jack was there but he wasn't, of course he wasn't, it was the end of the day and the school was empty except for the few kids who had decided to stay after but hardly anyone had because it was Friday and no one did and Alex wasn't thinking rationally and all he wanted to know was "why isn't Jack here?"

And there he was, standing at his locker, shaking and trying to get rid of everything wrong by breathing and then his History teacher, who seemed to be wandering aimlessly around the halls, told him that they were going to lock up the school soon and that he should get going. Alex left, his head still a hazy blur of every single thing that was going wrong. Alex wasn't really aware of how on earth he had managed to make his way home without somehow wandering into the road and getting hit by a car. Getting his by a car would be much less painful than what he was about to experience when he got home, and for a split second Alex almost turned back around to go back to Jack's house and talk to him and kiss him and play with his hair and not be shaking. Whenever Alex got nervous in any way, he would start shaking like a ripped shoelace in a hurricane simulator. There wasn't anything he could really do about it, he just had to let it pass but it fucking sucked and made him look even crazier than he felt. He had reached his street corner and quickly decided that he was going to get this over with in a similar fashion to ripping off a band-aid, slowly and painfully.

Alex was in for a hard night.


	12. In My Arms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Roofs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey I've given up on summaries. Evidently. Anyways, I hit 850 reads on Wattpad and We Are In The Crowd is coming back as Sainte and I'm ready to throw myself off of a bridge. Also, 3 chapters left till this story is over. Don't know if that's a good thing or a bad thing.

Alex had been hit by his father.

Which had happened before, and was just happening more and more consistently and Alex never really knew why he had been hit, well, he just knew that he must have done something wrong. The last time, he had been at Tom's funeral and had been adamant about not wanting to go. Dragged along by his parents regardless of his feelings, Alex had spent the entire funeral trying to breathe away all of his worries, which, not surprisingly, didn't work. He ended up leaving the service without telling anyone where he was going, and his father found him wandering around outside in the trees and wondering if things would be different if Tom was still alive.

The answer: they would be.

So Alex's dad shouted at him because, obviously, the easiest thing to do was just to simply sit in a room and not do anything at all, but everything that everyone had been saying about Tom and "what a shame" it was that he wasn't alive and that he had been "too young" had all gotten to Alex and Tom had always told him to drown everyone out at funerals because it was better not to hear anything at all when they went to a funeral of a family friend. Yet Tom had been alive for that one, holding Alex's hand so he wouldn't start shaking, and smiling at him when things got dreadfully serious and painful. But this was Tom's funeral, and no one was there to hold Alex's hand and make him feel better.

He thought a lot about the person designated to hold his hand these days, because that person was important and pretty, and that was before they had kissed on the hood of Jack's car but Alex still thought about him often but his thoughts were ruined by his father. So when Alex didn't reply to any of the angry words being shouted at him, and instead blatantly ignored his father, he had gotten hit.

Maybe he had understood it that time, because everyone was stressed and upset and he didn't want to blame his dad but then it happened again, and this time it was bad.

Alex knew that his parents were home as soon as he got there, because all of the telltale signs hung around the front of the house. The mailbox wasn't shut properly, the lights were on inside, the stones on the gravel path in front of their house had been moved to the side, everything seemed normal. Blood had already become a significant taste in his mouth, but the familiar flavor did nothing to bring him back out of his nervous daze, and he continued up the stairs of his house and in through the door as if nothing was wrong.

Something was wrong.

Evidently, Alex's parents had gotten the call from the principal and to them something was definitely wrong. So Alex walked in and immediately heard his name being shouted, a command for him to come into the kitchen. As though he was watching himself through a lens, Alex slowly walked into the kitchen, his eyes wandering back and forth from his mother to his father. And then they were shouting. Of all people, it was his parents who should know that when anyone shouted at Alex, he tuned out. If he was listening in the first place, any attention lapsed as soon as the person speaking to him raised their voice in the slightest. Yet neither of them used that knowledge that night, and Alex had had enough of everyone's yelling and he couldn't fucking stand them so he just said.

"I don't care." And then he got hit.

Alex had sort of expected it to be more dramatic, but he reacted in slow motion because he wasn't aware of what was happening but he was still shaking, he was shaking so hard and his mom was yelling but this time it wasn't at him it was at his dad and then he just slipped upstairs and locked his door even though his parents didn't like when he did that, and then he just kind of collapsed.

The little part of his wall between his bookshelf and his closet doorway had started to feel a little more like home than the rest of his house did, but then where you slept wasn't really home. If Alex had to really pick a place where he felt home, it would be anywhere in the company of Jack Barakat. Still in a shaky daze of pain and confusion, Alex spent a decent amount of time down on the floor lost in his thoughts, but the light had slowly faded out of his room and he finally came around to the realization that the sun had set and the world had moved on from what had happened earlier without him.

So he got to his feet and joined the world.

Joining the world mainly consisted of Alex sitting on his bed and watching the sky. It was the color of faded denim, the cool, calm shade that was left behind after the sun had set and all the fancy clouds had gotten out of the way. Alex loved the color of the sky right after the sunset, but right before the sky turned completely dark. There were tiny hints of pink and purple left in it but overall it was just a pale blue that housed darker wisps of clouds and Alex loved the color of everything, he just had no one to talk to about it.

Even though he had sort of gotten himself out of his daze, he lost track of time again when he watched the sky and this time when he came back around, a dark navy sky greeted him. The beauty had been lost. Alex felt lost, and wanted Tom and Jack and Rian and people that made him happy and safe but no, he was stuck in his room with an aching face simply because he didn't want to participate in some stupid math competition that would make the school look good. Why were people so horrible?

\-------

Something was hitting Alex's window. He first had to consider all of the possibilities as to what it could be, but then the tapping didn't stop and Alex's worries about his parents coming to yell at him some more about why they were being woken up by the sound of something that suspiciously sounded like rocks hitting the side of their house became stronger.

Pebbles. They were pebbles, pebbles picked out of the mix of gravel and whatever else was in the front path leading up to Alex's house; and of course, Jack was out there throwing pebbles at Alex's window in the stupid form a cliche that Alex wasn't sure if he appreciated or not. His hands shaking again, Alex managed to pry his window open which immediately caused a cease in the throwing of rocks.

"Hi!" Jack shouted in a voice that was way too loud, causing Alex to pull a finger up to his own lips and shushing him. "Sorry- I- can I come up?"

Jack had been thinking about Alex all day long, although his thoughts had taken a major detour and hadn't really gotten back on track yet but were headed there somehow. For some reason, he had felt that something was wrong and Alex usually came looking for him if something was wrong but no, he was up in his room having the audacity to shush Jack. There wasn't any other way to get Alex's attention (little did Jack know, there was) so he proceeded to embrace the cliche of throwing pebbles at Alex's window. Thus, when his boyfriend's shadowed face appeared notably holding an expression of fear, Jack faltered and spoke instead. And he was invited inside but only if he didn't make any noise until they got to Alex's room. Immediately obliging, Jack met Alex in the front entryway.

They hugged as soon as Jack shut the door behind him, Alex hanging on for dear life as if when Jack pulled back he would be gone forever. Alex was shaking again, nervous that his parents would walk downstairs because they heard the rocks, or Jack's voice, or the door slamming, or their footsteps or- or-

"What happened?" Jack broke the no noise rule without hesitating, and Alex could have slapped him right there and then. Jack realized what he had done, and quickly followed Alex up the stairs so he could finally talk. Alex shut the door slowly behind him, and turned around to face Jack.

"I swear to god-"

"No, stop." Jack hesitated, stopping only because Alex sounded fed up and it wasn't good to be fed up. Alex had another bruise on his face. And this one wasn't as bad as the other one that had turned multiple different colors before it had finally decided to fade back to his skin tone. The other one wasn't completely gone, but the new one on top of it made Alex look even more worn out.

"I got suspended. I cursed at the people and I got in trouble and I'm suspended and you are not supposed to be here and my parents are really really mad." Alex was shaking badly now, so Jack held his hands and looked him right in the eye. And Alex seemed to be trying to look away because he was nervous and just... scared, but-

"I love you. And school might be shit and your parents might be assholes but we've got exams and then school is over and everything is going to work out, you know that. And yeah, we've got a few months left but then we can go anywhere and do anything and be free for a couple months and everything is going to work out 'cause you've got me and Rian and... yeah. We're good." It was a pretty lame inspirational speech, but it helped Alex enough and all he needed right then was something to help enough.

"Yeah- I. Thanks." I love you. Another pause followed, and Jack seemed to realize what he had said.

"Can I clean your room?" He continued, finding a new task to work at that wasn't awkwardly comforting Alex. Jack didn't wait for a reply, and instead began pawing around Alex's closet.

"Are you looking for something?" Alex asked, slightly confused by what Jack was doing.

"I just want to decorate," Jack replied. He had a point, Alex's room was pretty bleak compared to Jack's poster splattered room that had clothes and random knick knacks strewn everywhere. Alex, not knowing what to do, awkwardly sat back on his bed and thought.

"Where were you after school?" He asked, not wanting to make a big deal out of how distraught he was, especially when Jack wasn't waiting at his locker but wanting to bring it up somehow.

"I was talking to Rian. He's having a rough time, you know."

"With what?"

"Life." Jack threw a tangle of Christmas lights behind him, letting out a joyful yell as he stood up with a box of paints. "You've got paints! And lights!"

"We're not painting my walls. Don't yell." Jack turned back around, noticing how uptight Alex was acting.

"We're not painting your walls. Can we hang up the lights?" Alex nodded, watching as Jack stood on his desk and taped the lights up in certain places, looping them around half of Alex's room. Alex bit his lip as he watched Jack work, standing on desks and chairs and eventually having to balance between the doorknob of Alex's closet door and the edge of a dresser. Alex couldn't help but giggle at how ridiculous Jack looked, struggling to tape up the lights. Fighting the temptation to plug in the lights and watch Jack fall out his his precarious position because of a minor electric shock, Alex shuffled his feet and bit at the inside of his cheek. Jack finally fell onto the floor, hitting the light switches on the way down and letting out a confused laugh as both of them were left in complete darkness. Crawling around on the floor for a while, Jack finally found the outlet and plugged in the fairy lights.

Jack had an idea of the expression that would dawn on Alex's face once he finally got the Christmas lights set up, and he couldn't help but smile himself. He didn't know why, but the little twinkly lights reminded him of the night that he and Alex had spent out under the stars, and he could tell that Alex was thinking about it too. In a marginally hyper way, Jack then asked if they could watch Home Alone.

So they did.

Home Alone was their movie, the movie that they always watched when they needed something to watch and talk over at the same time, which was exactly what they did. Both of them felt like they needed clarity on what was happening with each other and such, so they cuddled under Alex's warm comforter and talked in quiet voices and only sometimes giggled or yelled when Jack would lean too far in some direction and their shared earbuds would go flying and get lost in the blankets. And even though it wasn't something life-changing and mega important, it was enough positivity to stop Alex from shaking and frowning and worrying so much and by the time they had finished the movie and talking, Jack had gotten another idea and Alex had relaxed enough to look at the clock and realize that they were able to talk in normal tones as everyone had to be sound asleep by then.

Jack asked if he could play some music and Alex replied that he could if it was quiet so Jack played Motion City Soundtrack quietly which sounded weird but Alex liked them because one of their members had funny hair and Alex was all about funny hair. Jack Barakat had funny hair. Alex had always wondered about Jack's hair, about how damaged it might be, about how fluffy it would feel if it wasn't so spiky. By the end of the day, Jack's hair always ended up in some weird style that looked silly and tonight wasn't an exception. Alex reached out and patted Jack's hair, smiling.

"You've got soft hair." Alex said quietly, drawing his hand back.

"Thank you." Jack replied, beaming at him. Jack was proud of his hair and happy that other people liked it too. "Can I paint your back?" He then asked, nodding his head a bit to the song playing.

"What?" Alex asked, confused. Paint... his back?

"Paint your back. Yeah, like Tumblr girls. You have paint, why not?" Jack was grinning and Alex really didn't have any problem with it so he just replied with-

"What are you gonna paint?" Alex had never taken Jack for an artist, and was only slightly worried about what was going to be painted onto his skin.

"You'll see."

\-------

They had switched to Taking Back Sunday and Alex was falling asleep. The calm music and the feel of the brushes and paint being swirled around on his back was relaxing, and Jack was singing a bit and talked sometimes but otherwise it was a warm, wonderful silence that Alex absolutely relished. He had long since lost the worry of what Jack was painting, and had just relaxed into a calm daze.

Jack was certain that Alex had fallen asleep, and wasn't sure if he wanted to wake him up or not. His eyes were closed, the messy fringe of his hair falling over his face, a little strand of hair moving back and forth as it was blown by his rhythmic breaths. His back was covered in paint, and Jack couldn't help but feel proud of himself because he had really created a masterpiece.

The song changed to something louder, and Jack would have to make sure to personally thank Chad Gilbert some time in his life because Alex had woken up. He sat up, and Jack let out a little "it's not dry yet!" and Alex remembered that his back was covered in paint, so then he just stared at Jack.

"We'll let it dry then," he said, and then he got up. Jack watched him move toward the window and let out a nervous laugh when Alex opened it.

"Are you-"

"We'll let it dry on the roof." He finished, and climbed out of the window.

\-------

Alex seemed to have a thing for climbing out of windows, but it added to his magical persona so Jack never doubted anything about it. The moon was out and it was big and bright and Jack was terrified but exhilarated at the same time and he was on top of Alex's fucking roof, slipping and sliding and falling and laughing and hanging onto his boyfriend's ankles because he was going to break a limb sometime that night, he knew it for a fact. Eventually, they managed to find a precarious place to sit on the roof that didn't involve either of them sliding and falling down the triangular structure.

The stars were out, and silver tinged clouds slowly crawled across the indigo sky.

"Hey Jack?" Alex asked in a small voice.

"Yeah?"

"I'm glad you're here. I'm so glad you're here. You're very important, you know." Jack smiled, watching his breath fog up in the air in front of him.

"You're very important too. Thank you." Alex nodded, watching the sky. He was beautiful, Jack thought, he was so beautiful.

Jack couldn't believe that they were real right then, that he was sitting on a roof with the boy who had ignored him for the first few days of school, only to laugh when he had damaged the gym floor. He was up there with the boy who had curled up with him on the floor of Rian's shed, the boy who had called Jack's shirt hideous right before he had kissed him, the boy who had made Jack laugh so hard that he wished that he could be by Alex's side forever, the boy with the pretty hair and intelligent words who was sitting on his roof with the sunrise painted on his back and a smile sketched on his lips and love, so much love colored into his heart.


	13. Warmer Climate

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Paint and gayness.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm writing the last chapter right now and just taking a break to post this and I am so EMOTIONAL I'm 41 reads away from 1k on Wattpad and got YMAS and FOB are so good and GOD I AM EMOTIONAL READ THIS IT'S NOT GOOD

Jack was an artist and Alex had never been aware that he actually knew how to create art. Not that Alex thought that Jack wasn't capable of it, but a sunset that Alex had seen before had actually been painted on his back and Alex didn't want to get rid of it.

He had spent the next day wearing a baggy t-shirt as to not smudge the paint while hanging around his house and staring at the Christmas lights silhouetted against his wall. He had showered the next morning, not knowing why he was getting rid of the art on his back. Showering was always something that calmed him down; he should make a list of the things that calmed him down and why.

Showering helped in the way that it could wash everything away, and that was a good thing and a bad thing. One Halloween, his face had been smeared with makeup that he hadn't been able to get off the previous night and his body had been dirty and grimy and his mouth tasted like sugar and spice and everything unhealthy and gross. He had been all too excited to get in the shower, and had taken up all the hot water in the house which caused his mom to get mad at him but it didn't matter because he was clean. And once his parents had had one of their major fights that most times revolved around the fact that one of their sons was slowly becoming an alcoholic that wasn't even his mother's kid so she didn't want to deal with him and besides, he was an adult and should be able to take care of himself, and then their other son was completely fucked in the head and they didn't want to waste their money on medication and therapy or waste their time trying to help him. Alex had been semi-involved in the fight, because he had started off down in the kitchen where most of their fights took place and had ended up fully clothed sitting in a bathtub full of freezing water.

He had wondered how it would feel to fall asleep and simply slip under the water and stop breathing.

That wasn't a shower either, but every time he got clean in some way he got clean, clean like someone who hadn't used a bad drug or hurt themselves or drank alcohol in a long time. He was clean. His bathroom was white, the type of clean white that was due to there being an oddly placed skylight in the ceiling that lit up the whole bathroom that he could see the stars through at night and he had always wondered why of all places the skylight was in the bathroom but it made it really bright and nice.

So Alex showered. The paint fell and mixed with the water, a cascade of pink, blue, and yellow mixing with the clear water and falling around Alex's hair. He stayed under the water until it ran cold and then he still stayed there until the water was fully clear again.

Clear.

It was a Sunday, a day he usually designated for homework and doing nothing. Alex was probably going to spend the day painting, because he had paints and he was inspired and he wanted something to do and Jack was right, as he always was, Alex's room needed decoration. So while Alex was gathering paints and canvases and such, Jack was wondering how on earth he was meant to come out to his parents.

He had a boyfriend, one that he loved and valued and wanted his family to know about because Alex mattered to him and he didn't want to leave things like this in the dark. Essentially, Jack was going to come out to his parents and didn't exactly know how. He could just wander downstairs and hit them with a quick "I'm gay" and then run back upstairs and maybe pretend it never happened but he had a sinking feeling that that wasn't his best option so then he just sat. And thought.

It was always better to get whatever was being stressed about over with without too much planning, because then it's faster and it works out but Jack didn't know how this was going to work out and his parents were okay, they were unfair and rude sometimes but they weren't outright homophobic and Jack was pretty damn sure that he was not a heterosexual so... so. So he should just get it over with but he didn't know how.

After pacing around his room enough times to make the people who participated in Olympic walking jealous, Jack had come up with absolutely nothing to help himself do this so instead he just went downstairs. He wondered what Zack would say if he outright told him that he was gay. Jack thought that he would probably be called a faggot or disgusting or something, because Jack had mentioned liking boys before but Zack had never really taken it seriously. Now, Jack was making it serious.

His parents were downstairs in their normal places, his dad on the red couch reading a book and his mom in the brown armchair, sketching. His mom looked up at him, her pencil stopping as if she was waiting for him to say something first.

"So," Jack started, hesitating near the edge of the stairs. "Hi." Neither of his parents said anything, and just watched. "I need to... talk. To you. Guys." They were still silent, and just watched him with curious eyes.

"Go ahead," his mom said slowly, obviously waiting for bad news. His dad shut his book.

"I'm gay."

They both paused for a while. Eventually, Jack's dad shrugged, while his mom kept looking him up and down.

"Are you sure?" She finally asked, to which Jack replied-

"Yes. I, um, yeah, I have a boyfriend." His dad laughed, and his mom sat up, serious now.

"You're not kidding?" She asked, a somber look dawning on her face. Jack's heart sank, a sort of hopelessness filling his chest.

"Nope," he said, trying to keep his voice lighthearted. The worst thing was, they looked disappointed. Jack didn't know if he'd rather be straight, because he was sick and tired of hearing gay used as an insult, and he was sick and tired of the stupid fucking gay stereotypes and he was tired of all the shit that made being gay sound so bad and he knew that if he told his parents that he had a girlfriend, they wouldn't laugh at him or ask him if he was serious. Because he was serious but no, he was gay so that didn't make it serious anymore. Not at all. But Jack wanted to be gay, he wanted to kiss boys and love boys and cuddle with boys and he wanted boys. He was happy enough as he was now, happy with his boyfriend, happy knowing that at least one person loved him, and he was proud to know that that person was a boy. Jack was really fucking gay, and he was really fucking serious about it but then his mom gave him this defeated look that made him feel defeated, and he wished that he had never said anything in the first place.

"Who's your boyfriend?" The word "boyfriend" was dripping with sarcasm, and Jack found himself getting defensive.

"Alex." Jack's dad was really laughing now, and Jack was just finished.

"Okay, okay. Ha ha, I was just kidding." He tried to make his voice sound as angry as possible, and it came across pretty well. He didn't wait to see what his parents reactions were, because he was leaving the house because he had better places to be than standing in his living room feeling like he was embarrassing himself even though he wasn't, not at all.

\-------

"Do you ever just feel like a Simple Plan song?"

Jack had never heard something more relatable in his life, and gave Rian and appreciative look. They were sitting on Rian's floor, both boys doing Rian's homework, due to him being in all honors classes and not being able to deal with all the stress and work put on him. Jack hadn't wanted to complain about the coming out issue to Alex, and instead had gone to Rian's house where they had a proper whining session.

It was good for them.

Rian's problems came off as more serious to Jack than his own issues did, because no one ever takes their own issues more seriously than someone else's problems. And yeah, it was a little hard to concentrate on what they were saying when Rian had some really fucking hard science homework to go and Jack didn't really know what he was doing but he was doing it because Rian needed some help and the least Jack could do was help out with some science work.

"What, like, Addicted? I'm a dick-" Jack started singing, and Rian laughed, his marker slipping on the poster he was decorating. It had been too long since Jack had heard Rian actually laugh, and this one was about as fake as the others. Rian looked bad, he looked tired and sick, two things which weren't good at all. And though he had talked to Jack more about what was going wrong, but he wasn't getting nearly as close to the point as he had gotten the day down on the field behind the school.

Jack was afraid that there was some sort of barrier between them now.

And when you know for a fact that your friend may be regularly considering suicide and you feel like a barrier is growing between you, you need to do something about it. So Jack was trying to make Rian laugh while helping him with homework at the same time, but neither seemed to actually be happening so Rian's fake laugh drifted off into an awkward silence as he fixed the mistake the marker had scrawled across his paper. Jack kept working on the science packet, absolutely bullshitting his way through it because Rian was in an AP class and Jack was in the grade level class.

"Jack, do you know what you're doing?" Rian asked, looking up. There was a marker hanging out of the side of his mouth, open, and another dangling from his fingers as he traced over his marker. The poster was something for math class, about roads and costs and was covered in algebra that Jack had understood for about a day back in seventh grade and had long since forgotten how to do. Apparently, Jack wasn't the most scholarly student.

"Um." Jack said, looking down at the scrawling handwriting that even he couldn't read. "Maybe?" He mumbled, looking hopelessly up at his friend. Rian reached out for the paper, dropping the open marker on his leg, watching as the purple ink stained his leg. He capped the marker and shook out the paper, analyzing Jack's work. After a long pause, Ryan sighed, and dropped the paper back on top of his poster.

"Jack, why are you here?" It was a question that stopped Jack short, because he thought that Rian realized that he was just trying to help. Rian had said that he had felt like no one had been paying any attention to him, and Jack was there, trying to make him feel like there were people who cared. Maybe he was being too forward, or maybe he was just being annoying. Was he being annoying?

"I... I just, I thought you might need some help." Rian stared right at Jack, almost as if he was looking through him.

"I'm not gonna kill myself." Rian said this as if it would clear everything up, and maybe it cleared a few things up because Jack was fairly certain at that point that Rian wasn't going to kill himself, but it still wasn't enough.

"That's not the only thing I'm worried about," Jack protested, though it was the main worry that he had and Jack really needed to figure out how to make people feel better.

"Really? Because if I don't die by the time summer break starts, any worries you have about me are going to vanish into thin air." Jack paused, and he knew that this was true. He knew that he didn't care enough, and he knew that his attempts to help weren't doing anything at all. His hopeless eyes met Rian's, and Jack stood up, knowing it was time to go.

"No- wait," Rian started, because this was a friendship that he needed, he needed Jack to sing Simple Plan songs to him to make him laugh and do his science homework even though he had gotten everything completely wrong. "What's wrong?" Rian asked, finally on the asking end rather than the receiving of the question. Jack turned back around, relief clear on his face, and started talking.

"I came out. To my parents. As gay, because I am gay and they won't take me seriously and I feel like a little fucking kid and it's not okay that they can actually laugh at their son because he has a boyfriend, like, it's just a shitty thing to do! And I feel shitty because I love Alex, I love Alex and they're making me feel like my feelings are just invalid and stupid and something to laugh about!" Rian frowned, not being able to relate on the gay subject but being able to relate in feeling shitty and feeling that his feelings were invalid, so he spoke.

"Well why do their opinions matter, then? If they took it well, you wouldn't have anything to worry about and you'd be fine. They didn't take it as well as they could have, and you're still the same. How are they going to change anything?"

"They're going to change how I feel."

"Why are you letting them? You were fine before they knew." Rian made his point, and Jack was beginning to understand it.

"But, but now they know." Jack mustered, obviously not finding the appropriate words for his argument that was slowly falling apart. Rian gave a little half smile, the face of someone who knew that they had said the right things. Jack gave up, and sat back down on the floor.

"Do you have any homework that I can actually understand?" He asked pathetically, watching the smile on Rian's face grow.

"Not really."

So Rian properly did his science while Jack lay on the floor while singing "Perfect," by Simple Plan, because yeah, sometimes he did really feel like a Simple Plan song.


	14. The Only Noise

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A vague but well detailed chapter that's just throwing my emotions into a story.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hit 1k on Wattpad and I'm about to upload the last chapter I'm so emotional. This has been one hell of a ride.

School sucked.

And that was true, no matter who was talking. Some false sense of stability had finally been installed in the lives of innocent students throughout the year, and they had gotten a sort of schedule worked out. Which was, as it had to be, completely and absolutely ruined once mid-May rolled around, because exams started around then and all of the math ones were scheduled on the last week of school and Jack Barakat was really bad at math and wasn't counting on passing his year. Alex was great at math, "exceptionally" great at it, and would have totally helped Jack with his work if he wasn't dealing with a particularly exciting in-school-suspension.

So.

Everyone was stressed over everything and as June and the more important exams forced their way into people's lives, the lunch table that was usually full of conversation fell silent except for the occasional "I hate my life." Binders, folders, papers, and writing utensils of all kinds were scattered across the entire table. Rian, Alex, and Jack had their science exam after lunch, which was at some ungodly hour in the morning that was right after their first hour and a half of sitting around, eating crackers, and stressing. None of them looked very good, not at all.

Jack had given up on doing his hair, and was wearing the clothes that he slept in and dark circles under his eyes. He had been surviving off of a solid diet of Ritz crackers and cranberry juice, which meant he usually had an expression on his face that made him look like he had just drunk balsamic vinegar and milk at the same time. Alex's hair was too long, and it had always been too long, but now it was at a length that made it look sort of ugly to the ordinary eye, though Jack still thought it was his favorite hair. Except for the girl with really pretty pinky-purple hair who was a sophomore. But Alex's hair was still better than hers. Alex had also seemingly thrown a black and white lens in front of his eyes and had ceased speaking about color for quite some time, although he threw the occasional remark in about how something looked. It was obvious that he was exhausted, and he didn't do anything to try to show that he wasn't. Rian was probably faring the worst through exam season, because his stupid AP teachers were still giving him homework of sorts through everything. And it was obvious that he was still not really comfortable being alive at that time, and Alex and Jack couldn't do as much as they wished they could because god damn exams took everything that they had.

And it wasn't fucking fair.

Alex had been sleeping at Jack's house. They had worked it out somehow, and they had loved it and felt peaceful for once. They had woken up together, got to smile at each others warm faces first thing in the morning, had gotten to smell each others toothpaste first thing in the morning, and yeah, they really had loved it. But then exams had started and everyone had sort of drifted apart when that happened, and yeah, that was them, spending all day around each other but barely speaking to each other. It was a weird feeling.

"You know, we have like, two or three more exams left and then we're done. We're done, and it's summer. Things are gonna be better." Jack's words seemed to leave no effect on the other two boys at the table, and Rian gave a half-assed nod which caused him to drop an open highlighter on his arm. It left a pink streak, and Rian hissed a bit, hurriedly picking it back up. He seemed to be really good at regularly dropping markers on himself.

"Can we do something? Like, today? After school?" Jack asked, and Jack kept asking things like this because he needed to spend time with people. Usually, home was an okay place, but it seemed more like him and his parents were fighting a cold war these days. He had sat at the top of the stairs a few nights ago and listened to their conversation.

"-okay with it?" His mom had asked his dad, her voice already shaking and trembling.

"What else can we do? He says he's gay, we can't change how he feels!" His dad was raising his voice, and Jack could imagine his mom getting angry because he was angry and everyone being angry, fueling each other's hate off of everyone else's emotions.

"I don't- I don't know! But it makes me sick, it makes me sick to my stomach. Imagine him, our son, kissing a man. Going to prom with a man. Marrying a man. Imagine." She sounded like she was on the verge of tears. Jack was barely breathing.

"Joyce-"

"And you're saying that there's nothing we can do about it!" She was getting hysterical now, and Jack would have rolled his eyes except for the fact that he was getting pretty emotional himself.

"What can we do? If he's happy how he is then why do you want to change things?"

"Because I'm not happy with how he is!" Jack let out a loud, shuddering breath, and then their voices went silent. They had heard him. It didn't matter anymore, he had known that they didn't support him from the start. He had stood up and gone back to his room, staying up all night to watch the sky. He knew Alex had been watching it too, and had wondered what his boyfriend would have said about it. Probably something beautiful.

\-------

They kissed at the front doors. It was a good kind of kiss, a kind of kiss that involved hands in hair and hands on faces and it was a pretty kiss, a kiss that people whistled at, which they did. Alex had pulled back, blushing. His hair was messy, messier than usual and the nervous energy that had been hanging over him all month had seemed to lessen a bit. He had one exam left, the math one next week, the one that he had no reason to worry about. And he kissed his boyfriend because his boyfriend was upset and sometimes a kiss could make things better.

After the kiss, Jack and Rian and Alex went. They walked, roaming the sidewalks of the Baltimore suburbs, they walked and talked and joked sometimes. They laughed. They ended up next to the train tracks, laying in the grass. All eyes were fixed on the bright blue sky above them, and then Jack spoke; always the first one to speak.

"Are you guys scared?" His question echoed in the air, and then seemed to fade into the humidity. Alex and Rian might have asked "scared of what?" but they knew what Jack meant.

"Yeah." Rian answered, sure of his answer. "I'm terrified."

"Me too," Alex answered in a small, soft voice. "I don't know what's out there and I don't know what I'm going to do and I'm worried. I'm not smart enough for anything in the real world." Both Jack and Rian knew that was bullshit, but no one called it.

"You're good at math," Jack said quietly. "I'm not good at anything important."

"Sense. You've got common sense. And you can deal with things," said Rian, wondering how many scales dragons usually had on their tails. He knew that it probably depended on the size of the scale and the size of the tail, but he was thinking about the average dragon. Maybe... 30 something?

"How many scales do you think an average sized dragon has on their tail?" He asked, staring at the huge white dragon in the sky hanging over their heads.

"Thirty-six," Alex breathed, realizing what Rian was looking at. Jack giggled at that, a sound that all three boys relished and didn't even know that they had been missing from their lives.

"Thirty-six," he repeated, gently taking Alex's hand. Alex held on tight, like he always did, like the thing he was most afraid of in the whole world was letting go.

\-------

Snip. Snip.

"I'm worried."

"Don't be."

Snip.

"I'm very worried."

"I know what I'm doing."

Snip.

Jack was cutting Alex's hair. They sat in Alex's bathroom, Alex in the bathtub and Jack on the edge of it. They were in a sort of late night daze that they found themselves in lots of times; this time was because there was more fighting in Jack's house and he had managed to sneak out. As he usually did, he suggested watching Home Alone but Alex said that he had a headache so instead Jack painted one of Alex's arms while Alex tuned an old guitar that Jack had found clearing out his room. And then Jack had asked if he could cut Alex's hair.

So there they were, Jack wielding a pair of red scissors that were painfully blunt and chopping into Alex's hair with them. Jack was worried. Not only about how Alex would react to the state of his hair, but about exams and such. Jack had his spanish exam the next day and his math one the next week. He didn't excel in either of those subjects, and he was taking out all of his dumb worries on Alex's hair.

"Hey!" Came the yell that Jack had been expecting, and he realized that he had fucked up and Alex had swirled around, pulling his hand back to the back of his head. Jack saw his eyes widen when he felt how much hair he was missing at the back.

"Jack-"

"I bet it looks fine, I don't bet, I am sure it looks fine." Alex stared at him, and Jack stared right back. It was quiet for a few seconds, and then Alex spoke very quietly.

"Take a picture."

Jack did, and showed it to Alex, who then vowed that he was never looking in the mirror again. Then he sent Jack home.

And Jack went home, to crash on his bed and curl up and wonder if things would be different if he had never thought Alex's hair was so beautiful. He was just bridging the gap to overthinking when his phone rang. The number was blocked, but Jack picked up for the sake of picking up; he sort of wanted to speak to someone.

"Hello?" He asked, groggy and tired.

"Hi." Jack recognized the voice on the other end of the line immediately, and sat up fast enough to make his head spin. He considered hanging up, he should have hung up, but instead dropped his phone and picked it back up right away, only to hear nothing but silence from the other end of the call.

"Zack?" Jack asked, knowing all too well that it was Zack and he was just asking because he didn't know what else to say.

"I'm sorry." Jack paused. "I am," Zack continued, "I've been such a dick, I had been and I have been and I'm sorry, I treated you terribly." Jack didn't reply. He didn't need to reply, because Zack knew that Jack wasn't as stupid as he thought he was. Zack had overestimated his friend, and the silence between them said enough.

"Fuck off."

\-------

It was freezing cold and the clock was broken. Jack felt like crying. The boy next to him was folding his empty chip bag into origami shapes, and Jack was watching him out of the corner of his eye. Jack didn't know his name, they had no classes together, but he seemed interesting enough and Jack had sat by his side every single day for all of the exams. The bag crinkled and someone sighed. Everyone in the room had finished their exam, but their teacher-proctor person had to wait for the email to let them know that everyone had finished testing. Tomorrow was the last day of school, and Jack was getting all too emotional over the fact that he had made it through the whole damn year. Which was why he felt like crying. And there he sat, wrapped up in the fuzziest blanket he could have found in the house, shaking from nerves and underhanded relief and cold.

And then the bell rang.

Everyone was out of their seats in seconds, and Jack glanced around, perplexed. People were yelling, shouting, grinning, and most important, running, running out of the class and into the halls, ready to get out of the school. Jack stood up, swaying on his feet. The boy with the chip bag turned to him, smiling.

"We're done," he breathed, an ecstatic look on his face. Jack nodded, wishing he could share the boy's feelings. They walked out of the class together, the boy turning left when someone called his name. Patrick. So Patrick skipped off down the hall while Jack watched him go. He had sort of been waiting for Alex to be waiting for him, which was a stupid thing to wait for. Alex was always the one waiting.

There he was, standing at his locker, the hood on his sweatshirt up for once because of his hair. Jack moved as though he was in a daze, and slowly made his way down the hall. Alex turned and saw him, a smile appearing on his face just from seeing Jack's. But the smile died when he saw the tears welling in his boyfriend's eyes, and he met him in the middle of the hallway, wrapping his arms around Jack in a hug. When they finally pulled back, Alex saw that Jack was actually crying, which was confusing.

"We're done," Jack said, his voice weak.

"We're done," Alex replied. We're done.

\-------

Jack needed a break and that was obvious to Alex. Rian was planning a thing for tomorrow, a thing that involved getting out of school earlier than they were supposed to, not exactly ditching but kind of sort of ditching, and Jack just felt like going home and getting all of his emotions together. He had lay around listening to Green Day for a while before he realized that he should actually deal with what was happening.

So he turned off the music and talked to himself. After a while, he had come to realize that the main problem was that things were changing. And change had never been something that Jack was good with. His problem was that the summer was going to happen, and that he was going to walk into school the next year with Alex at his side feeling completely and utterly different. Because last year he had met Alex on the second week of school because of a major change in his life but he didn't exactly know why he felt like there was a change. Maybe it was because things still felt exciting. Because he still blushed when he saw Alex and felt like he was coming up for air after almost drowning when he kissed him. And staying up all night to talk about stars and the color of the sky was the most enjoyable thing he could think of and he just didn't want that to stop.

He didn't think it would.

But it might, and it could, and he didn't want anything bad to happen to Alex and he didn't want anything bad to happen to himself but they only had one year left together. And that was terrifying, to think that when high school ended their relationship would end. That everything good, that everything he had come to get used to would leave. Thoughts spun around Jack's head, colliding together and being far too intrusive; and then his door opened.

Almost glad for a distraction, Jack sat up and looked at his dad, who was standing slouched in his doorway.

"We need to talk." He stepped inside Jack's room and shut the door behind him, which immediately worried Jack.

"What happened? Did something bad happen?" Jack asked, properly sitting up now, ripping his headphones out of his ears.

"No, no. I, um. I'm sorry." That was always a good way for a parent to start off a conversation, and Jack felt obliged to listen to his father. "About the... coming out thing. And school ends tomorrow and I want you to be able to enjoy your summer and you've just seemed sort of... sad. Lately. And I'd just like to apologize on behalf of your mom, too." Jack stared at his dad, dumbfounded. When had either of his parents seriously apologized for any one of their actions?

"Listen, I laughed at you. Which wasn't good at all, and I know your mom doesn't accept it, but, well, I support you. And you're my kid and there's really nothing that could stop me from caring about you. Like, it's my job to raise you and take care of you and if you're gay then oh well, I just want you to be happy. And you seem to be happiest with Alex, which makes me happy that you get to be happy. Right? So, again, I want to apologize."

Jack stared at his dad, shocked.

"Thank.. you? Thank you." His dad nodded, retreating behind the door again. As the door shut behind him, Jack stopped to realize that he really needn't worry too much.


	15. Perfect Little Secret.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The. End. It's long and happy and fairly nostalgic so.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I put this on ao3 because my friend told me to so it's not as big as Wattpad, it's only got about 150 reads on here. Or not even. But I got a few kudoses (??) and some bookmarks and a COMMENT I got one comment that was pretty cool so thanks for reading this if you did!

Loneliness was something that Jack Barakat hadn't felt for a while.

And he didn't think he would in the near future, because he had Rian and Alex and at least one pretty decent parent and the realization in his mind that no one was out to get him for once, not even Zack. That morning, Jack had properly gotten back into the swing of things. He had put on his usual skinny jeans and t-shirt (today was a New Found Glory one because Jack still had to thank Chad Gilbert) and had spiked his hair like he usually did. May had driven him to school, and he had told her to tell their parents that he was sleeping over at Rian's that night.

And he walked into school. A sort of nervous feeling hung over him, and he wasn't sure why it was there but it was whether he liked it or not so he dealt with it. And there he was, standing at his locker, just like he had the first day they had met. Wearing the same clothes, the same beautiful hair falling around his face, Alex Gaskarth hadn't changed at all since that day back in September. Yet he had, because everything had changed, but Alex was facing Jack today.

Maybe that was it. It was the first thing that made Jack smile, how Alex was standing. One of his legs was bent back against his locker, the other one on the ground. His back was against the locker, that one locker that he had waited by every single day. A smile was growing on Alex's face as Jack walked closer, and it grew into a full on grin when Jack finally reached the locker.

"Hello there," Jack began, his voice as strong and bright as it had sounded on the first day of school. "I'm Jack." Alex didn't reply, his grin growing so big that Jack began smiling too.

"What's your name?" Alex gave the tiniest shake of his head, his tongue pressed between his teeth. "First class?" Alex was really laughing now, and he stepped forward to rise the tiniest amount up on his tiptoes to kiss Jack. He took a step back, cheeks flushed and eyes bright.

"I'm Alex Gaskarth. Nice to meet you."

\-------

It was their last lunchtime. They had switched lunch tables to be closer to the doors that lead to the back stairs on the right side of the school nearest the easily accessible parking lot because Rian and Cass had expertly planned their escape. Thankfully, no one had so much as looked at their regular table so no one had to feel jealous about not sitting at the regular table. None of them ate either, as it was a short day and they had lunch at around 11 in the morning, which was too early for anything, really. Most of the other juniors were either not at school or in the junior courtyard, so the trio was sitting in a semi-empty cafeteria full of freshman and sophomores who had been forced to go to school that day. The usual guy who hung around the cafeteria and screamed-

"High school! Lunch is over! Don't forget your phones or your bags or your books!" was there that day but didn't seem alert at all, and Rian was cool with him so it didn't really matter. So they sat, tapping their legs and tugging their shoelaces and messing with their hair, and then Rian's phone buzzed. All of the little ticks and movements seemed to halt at once, and everyone stared around at each other. Rian stood up slowly, and was followed by Jack and Alex. They slipped out of the propped-open doors casually, in a way that suggested they were going to finish eating lunch out on the back steps and enjoy the sun, but Cass's ugly white pickup truck that looked like it was going to fall apart any second was sitting there, and then they made a break for it. Rian jumped into the shotgun seat, as no one else had really expected to get it but him, and Alex and Jack got into the back.

It was the exact stereotype of an early summer day, with a light sort of humidity in the air but not enough to properly ruin hair and make people sweat. The sky was a light blue color that almost seemed to fade in a gradient to a deeper shade of sapphire. It was the kind of color that Alex would be talking about, but he was busy listening to Cass talk. Right. Jack hadn't heard any of it because his head was sort of spinny and it was bright outside and then they were driving past the high school on the other side of the road. Alex and Rian yelled, smiling and laughing. There seemed to be a hole in the glass to the division between the back of the truck and where Cass and Rian were, so Alex and Jack could hear them quite clearly.

Yet Jack wasn't listening, because he was caught up in his own thoughts and obviously sort of distracted. Everything was bright and Cass had started blasting Lady Gaga and Alex was there, trying to talk to Rian through the crack in whatever material blocked off the main part of the truck from the back, and then they hit the highway. Jack didn't even know where they were going, but it sure did involve the highway and then Alex was really laughing, his hair flying around crazily and his shirt flapping in the wind. Jack had always remembered his dad telling him to roll up the windows in the car when they reached bigger roads that condoned faster speeds, but he had never sat in the back of a pickup truck and been buffeted by winds going the speed of light. Or maybe just a little slower.

Jack, only slightly scared of falling out of the car onto the rapidly moving highway beneath him, moved to a corner of the truck, Alex quickly following him and basically sitting on his lap. Still curious and finally remembering why he was curious, Jack asked Alex where they were going. His reply was quick and the words heavy with excitement: Ocean City.

\-------

Ocean City, Maryland, was probably one of the worst places ever to go to spend a day. Yet Cass had driven them the two hours down there with no breaks, just straight driving. Traffic was light, as it was around 11 in the morning on a school day, and summer obviously hadn't officially started yet. Rian was the only person who had actually been to the beach before because cousins and extended family always tended to end up going on family outings at tacky beaches with bad boardwalks and too many sunburned kids in last year's bathing suits that were too small but their moms had insisted on making them wear because they wouldn't be swimming much anyways this summer, so what was the point of buying a new swimsuit?

It was, after all, just a beach.

But it was a beach and there was a boardwalk and that was the part that got Alex hooked, obviously. Though the lights might not get brighter until later, there was still a whole ocean there, a cerulean exhibition of sand, shells, and water, always water. Water that changed and moved and flashed and hit the shore and swam back out to the middle of nowhere. Water that was green and white and blue and black and was peaceful sometimes and killed sometimes. It was all there, something that was a complete marvel when one stopped to think about it. There was so much that everyone knew about it, but so much that everyone didn't. The ocean was mysterious, probably the most mysterious thing in the world. And it was so easily accessible, because driving two hours brought them right to it, and there stood the four of them, their feet already sandy though they hadn't even walked onto the beach yet.

All in all, the ocean was fantastic.

The beach was fairly empty for a Friday morning at one in the afternoon, but everyone knew that the tourists would start showing up as the day wore on, so the four stood and considered what to do for a second before Alex did what all of them were thinking.

He made his way down onto the sand, pulling off his hoodie before walking otherwise fully clothed into the ocean. So Jack followed him, like he always did. Alex and Jack usually worked in a way that involved one following the other in some way, and this time Jack removed his shoes and followed Alex right into the not even surprisingly cold Atlantic Ocean. No one got to complain.

But no one had to complain, because they got to swim, regardless of heavy jeans or jewelry, none of them had brought bathing suits or had been prepared at all for swimming, but that didn't matter. They got to feel like it was really summer.

The day wore on like that, their bodies getting covered in water and sand, their feet leaving marks that would be washed away all too soon on the soaking shoreline, their eyes taking in the atmosphere around them, their mouths speaking words that floated off into the air and made their mark on each other. They were alive, and they felt it too. Rian Dawson, Cassadee Pope, Jack Barakat, Alex Gaskarth, they were alive. And maybe it meant swimming out to where the water got dark and cold and a little rougher than everywhere else, or maybe it meant lying on the hot sand with a cold body, or maybe it meant kissing someone and tasting saltwater on their lips, but none of that even mattered because in the end, they were there and they were happy and they were alive, and that was what truly mattered.

Other people had started to show up, so Rian and Cass decided to disappear down the beach to get away from everyone and probably do other things that didn't need to be mentioned, but that was just because Alex and Jack didn't know what they would be doing. At all. Obviously. Moms had set up beach umbrellas and kids were building sand castles and getting stinging water in their eyes; everyone was avoiding Jack and Alex. They kept kissing. And splashing each other. Splashing each other always ended up in splashing other people, and other people didn't always want to be splashed, but the pair completely disregarded that because if someone didn't want to be splashed, they could just avoid them.

It came to the point where there were lots of kids appearing around them when Jack suggested that they swim out again to where the buoys were, and Alex agreed. So they swam. Alex had been giggling since they had gotten in Cass's truck, and laughed with water in his mouth as he grabbed Jack's ankles as they swam, dragging his boyfriend down. Spluttering, Jack pulled his head back up, laughing and coughing. He was pedaling his feet underneath him now, almost relishing the freedom of his legs in the cold water around him. They reached the buoys, Alex hanging on one in a fashion that was highly not allowed, seeing how far he could drag the thing down, like everyone has done with kick boards at some point in their life in swimming pools. Jack watched him struggle with the buoy, still kicking his feet under the water to keep him upright. Eventually, Alex gave up, and turned to Jack, a smile still bright on his face.

"Can I get a ride back?"

So Alex got a piggy-back ride through the ocean on Jack's shoulders, one that involved a lot of salt water in Jack's mouth and a lot more laughing from Alex. They were feeling that kind of happiness, the kind that kept coming back to them and making them feel like they wouldn't be left alone, but it always seemed to sneak away when they weren't looking. This time, like every other time, Jack felt like this was the time that happiness wouldn't leave him. And maybe this time, it wouldn't.

This time, he would swim back to shore and live out the rest of his day on a happy high and this time he would live out his summer on a happy high that knocked some sort of inspirational sense into him, this time someone he loved wouldn't leave, this time he would fall even more in love with someone. This time was going to be right. This time, happiness would never leave him.

\-------

They got ice cream. Ice cream was very nice, and Jack and Alex ate it on a refreshingly empty part of the boardwalk while watching an angsty teenage girl fight with her mom a few feet down the beach from where they sat. Jack had gotten strawberry ice cream and had felt as upset as the girl, whose bangs prevented her from seeing most things and caused her to trip over her feet quite often, when he realized that there were frozen chunks of strawberries in there. Alex had gotten the bubblegum ice cream because it was multicolored and very pretty, and it stained his tongue blue. But his had bits of gum in it, so they switched for a bit so Alex could chew on frozen strawberries and Jack could on bits of gross cold bubblegum.

They sat in silence, holding hands, and watched in sort of alarm as the angry emo girl marched their way.

"Where did you get the ice cream?" She snarled in a completely menacing way, leaving Jack and Alex confused and alarmed.

"Down there," Jack said, vaguely waving his hand around in the direction of the shop. She brushed some of the hair out of her face and gave Jack a venomous glare.

"Thanks," she spat as though it physically hurt her to say it, and marched away from them. Alex didn't start laughing until she had marched away, and abruptly stopped when they were addressed again, but this time by Rian. Him and Cass had finally made it back from wherever they had gone, and looked sort of very happy, their eyes bright and constantly meeting each others, their hands always sort of touching each others, their movements edgy and sudden, and Jack knew something had happened.

"We're here," announced Rian unnecessarily. Jack and Alex nodded, waiting for him to say more. "Just wanted to let you know," he continued, still talking unnecessarily.

"Well," Jack said, "thanks." Rian paused.

"Okay. We're going to go again." Alex nodded, chomping on a strawberry. "Can we meet back here at like, midnight or so?"

"Yeah," Alex and Jack said at the same time. Jack snapped some of the gum. They all stared at each other for a bit before Cass broke the silence, saying goodbye to them and dragging Rian off to wherever they would be.

"Can I talk seriously for a small amount of time?" Alex asked some time after they had left, sounding hesitant and frankly a little scared.

"'Course," Jack replied, curious. Alex paused, nibbling at the ice cream cone.

"I guess I'd just like to thank you." He began. It was a good way to begin, if there was any good way to even begin a sentence. Or a spoken paragraph. Whatever those were called. "For talking to me. And making me laugh. And making me hang out with you, I guess, because I didn't know anyone and I didn't think I wanted to but I know you and I'm so glad I do because without you, I would be so... sad." Jack didn't know if Alex would say more, so he chewed his freezing gum and stayed silent. "I just think I would be very, very sad without you and I'm very glad you're here and I don't think I've ever been happier in my life than when I've been with you. And I love you. So much." Alex had never really talked that much unless it was about color, and he switched the subject of his words when he exclaimed-

"Oh look, the sun is setting!"

Jack didn't reply at first, just watched the colors of the sky change. Alex watched it too, his eyes moving back and forth across the sky.

"Look at the clouds. It's like they've been raked across the sky with a rake with little bits of paint on the edges of that, we should do that! Rake the floor with paint on the rake! But look, look how they move across the sky! All slow, and they're bright pink! Well, maybe not bright. They're like cherry blossom pink. And the sky is cherry blossom pink too, down near the horizon and then it's orange, orange like the gross orange schools make field day shirts sometime. Wow. Look at that purple, isn't it odd how purple and orange look so nice together in the sky?" All of Alex's words sounded so familiar and comforting to Jack, and he replied softly.

"They do look nice." The clouds weren't the only things that looked nice, though, because Alex looked nice. His face was silhouetted in the darkening sky, his still freshly cut hair choppy around the edges of his face. Instead of the usual lovely color that his hair was, it was a still lovely purple that made his face look like a deep amethyst color. The sky reflected in his dark eyes, those soft lips curled from a mouth that was barely open in a sort of expression of awe, and Jack wondered why he hadn't drawn him yet. Maybe it was his lack of artistic talent or maybe Jack didn't want to ruin the perfect drawing he had created his head by putting it out on paper. He was speechless though, he was shocked, and he was so lucky. Alex was the same person that he had been in September, but he wasn't. The tired circles under his eyes had disappeared and the rough tone of his voice that came from hardly talking had faded into a sort of warm rasp, little smile lines had appeared in his previously otherwise sad looking face and his eyes had brightened from the dull gaze they had one possessed.

Jack thought too little of himself; he had singlehandedly changed someone's life completely for the better and didn't give nearly himself enough credit for it.

\-------

They were covered in stuffed animals and laying down in the back of the car when Jack saw it. At first he wasn't sure what it was because he was tired and still damp from the ocean and sort of shell shocked, but then it became sort of clear to him what it was so he started yelling. Through the mess of words that came out his mouth as rapid fire speeds, Cass managed to pull off the road and into the parking lot of what Jack had suspected to be a "trampoline place."

It was. Rian and Alex started giggling when they all realized what it was, and everything just got better when they realized that it was a 24 hour type of place. They almost sprinted inside, though they were all sort of exhausted from the night, but it was a trampoline place and then they were inside, talking to the people at the desk and getting everything they needed to actually go inside.

It proved to be far more complicated than it needed to be, but it wasn't expensive and besides, it was a fucking trampoline place and nothing got better than that.

They got inside the trampoline part and Alex almost had to catch Jack because he almost fell down because he almost fainted because it was a room filled with trampolines. Cass seemed tired, happy, but tired which meant she wasn't really in the mood for going crazy on trampolines because she wasn't really an avid trampoline fan like Jack was. So she and Rian tried to see who could go higher than one another, while Alex and Jack ended up doing flips off of the walls and completely fucking with their heads because spinning around in the air tends to do that. But it was good, it was good to be able to literally bounce off of walls and hear the absolutely beautiful laugh of people they loved right next to each other.

In the end, they left the trampoline place after a while of them being there. Cass was sort of falling asleep and watching and hearing Rian talk to her gently and softly holding her hand to lead her back to the car did a part in making Jack's night, but it was more than that. Since Cass was drifting away into dreamland in the passenger side of the car, Rian got to choose what music to play, and he played it quietly, but Alex and Jack still heard it out in the back of the car.

It was New Found Glory. And it shouldn't have mattered too much to them but it did because Alex had worn Jack's New Found Glory shirt when they had gone and properly kissed each other after watching for falling stars, and it had been New Found Glory that had been the reason Alex had woken up so they could go sit on his roof and watch the sky and breathe. Jack had to thank Chad Gilbert. And he had to also thank Cass the next morning, because it was all thanks to her that he was sitting in the back of that car, surrounded by jumbo stuffed animals that they had won at all sorts of boardwalk games earlier that night.

"I want to see all of this forever." Alex's voice sounded quiet, odd in comparison to the rushing sounds of the highway surrounding them and the sound of low quality pop punk reaching them from the front of the car. Alex was nestled in between a giant Yoshi and a huge caterpillar, his eyes soft and the smile that had been there that morning still clear on his face; Jack was beginning to doubt if it would ever leave. Yet though Alex said he wanted to "see" all of this forever, Jack knew that he meant more senses than just sight. Alex wanted to hear Chad Gilbert whining through the radio and the cars around them fly past, he wanted to hear the air cutting and rushing around him. Alex wanted to smell the odd scent of humidity that was a smell but was never mentioned as a smell, he wanted to smell the leftovers of cotton candy that hung on the stuffed animals around them, he wanted to smell the odd oily scent of the back of Cass's car. Alex wanted to taste the remainder of the strawberry ice cream from earlier and the very, very faint taste of blood in his mouth that always seemed to be there because of the cheek-chewing habit. Alex wanted to feel everything that he felt, content and happy and in love, so in love. It was a sensory achievement of sorts, to be able to identify and realize everything that was happening right then but he was alive and so was Jack, Jack who was sitting next to him and speaking words that didn't make as much sense as he'd like them to because neither of them wanted to see everything forever, they wanted to feel everything forever. Jack said it regardless of that because he wasn't about to contradict his boyfriend because of his inaccurate use of the five senses but he just said it because it made sense.

"Just keep your eyes open." 

-

Fin ;


End file.
